Stan

thebaz

Did anyone else think Stans pre and post match analysis , was at the level one would expect at Walsall - yes Ireland played better , but Germany would have won by 3 or 4 , but for Given . I have been an Irish fan for many years, this is the worst team I can remember, and whats worse we have an inexperienced man , on the point of losing the plot , in charge . What were the FAI doing appointing him, setting up another fall guy . Unbelievable.

Huggles

thebaz wrote:

Did anyone else think Stans pre and post match analysis , was at the level one would expect at Walsall - yes Ireland played better , but Germany would have won by 3 or 4 , but for Given . I have been an Irish fan for many years, this is the worst team I can remember, and whats worse we have an inexperienced man , on the point of losing the plot , in charge . What were the FAI doing appointing him, setting up another fall guy . Unbelievable.

Funny you should say that. When I saw his team I thought of a kid with a subbuteo set.

kinaldo

Whenever I see Steve Staunton being interviewd I automatically think of Dougal McGuire in Father Ted. Maybe that's because of the Apres Match sketches, or maybe it's just because he hasn't got a clue.

MrJoeSoap

thebaz wrote:

What were the FAI doing appointing him

Saving money tbh!

Huggles

kinaldo wrote:

Whenever I see Steve Staunton being interviewd I automatically think of Dougal McGuire in Father Ted. Maybe that's because of the Apres Match sketches, or maybe it's just because he hasn't got a clue.

LOL 'Well Ted'

The_B_Man

haha they woulda lost 3 or 4 nil if it wasnt for Given?

so they would alost 3 or 4 nil if it wasnt for the last line of defence? so they woulda lost 3 or 4 nil if it hand't been for a player that Stan picked to be our last line of defence? what if he had've picked O'Shea in goal? basically ur sayin that the reason we only lost 1 nil was coz Stan picked a good enough defence, as a whole. seriosuly like, they came 3rd in the world cup. where did we come? oh no wait, Ted...

finnpark

thebaz wrote:

Did anyone else think Stans pre and post match analysis , was at the level one would expect at Walsall - yes Ireland played better , but Germany would have won by 3 or 4 , but for Given . I have been an Irish fan for many years, this is the worst team I can remember, and whats worse we have an inexperienced man , on the point of losing the plot , in charge . What were the FAI doing appointing him, setting up another fall guy . Unbelievable.

I think his time is numbered. Its not his fault hes useless.

Kerr was worse and McCarthy before him. They didnt bleed any new talent through at all really. The only hope is to dump Kilbane, Reid Carr and O'Brien and throw in youngsters such as O'Brien, McGeady, Gamble etc.

The word on the street is that Terry Phelan is coming out of retiremnet to help him out at left back.

Pigman II

finnpark wrote:

They didnt bleed any new talent through at all really.

That's hardly an accurate statement.

17 of the 23 McCarthy took to WC2002 earnt their debuts under him and he also brought the average age of the squad down to 26 (it had been around 47 under Charlton).

Also Kerr threw caps round like they were sweets.

eirebhoy

thebaz wrote:

but Germany would have won by 3 or 4 , but for Given

As far as I can remember Given made 1 good save. We had 2 easy chances which both Keane and Dunne put over the bar.

As for bringing through players. There was no player coming through with Kerr in charge. As soon as he got the chop the likes of Ireland, O'Brien, etc. came along. He didn't experiment too much in friendlies but neither did Lippi and he won the world cup.

dajaffa

Brian Kerr had a great bunch of players and usually picked more or less a similar line-up to what you'd expect really. He just didn't seem to be ab;e to get the same spirit in the squad that had been there previously.

I think Stan has the spirit but referring to the players as "magnificent" afterwards was a joke. We were laughably bad when we had position and never looked capable of dictacting the pace of the game or threatening their goal apart from set pieces.

As for taking Duffer off? True he wasn't playing great, but Given aside nobody was and the odd time he did get the ball he looked like he could cause them problems. Personally I thought he should have put Liam Miller on, imo the best passing micfielder we have.

Superdub2

The_B_Man wrote:

haha they woulda lost 3 or 4 nil if it wasnt for Given?

so they would alost 3 or 4 nil if it wasnt for the last line of defence? so they woulda lost 3 or 4 nil if it hand't been for a player that Stan picked to be our last line of defence? what if he had've picked O'Shea in goal? basically ur sayin that the reason we only lost 1 nil was coz Stan picked a good enough defence, as a whole. seriosuly like, they came 3rd in the world cup. where did we come? oh no wait, Ted...

while i am not saying i necesarily agree with the original poster you are just being a smart arse making a silly comment like that! Stan never picked shay Given, Shay given picks himself and there is no other way about it but he did pick the other members of the defence

Steve Staunton, while creating a comical character out of himself with his attempts at being taken seriously, "im the gaffer" springs to mind, has still only got into the job and to be fair to him he has one on the worst squads to choose from in living memory! while Mc Carthy had Keane to constantly save his bacon Staunton doesnt have that and his two best outfield players in Robbie Keane and Duff didnt perform. as for duff that guy seems to be going backwards

Bateman

Our only hope is that he is playing the game when it comes to dealing with the media; they wanted a funeral, he's not going to give it to them. We can only hope (and maybe if we're optimistic, assume) that he will be saying something totally different to the players to that which he said to the media. For the moment, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. We will learn a lot more from the Cyprus game than we learned last night.

thebaz

Why was Kerr dumped to be replaced by Stan ?
Yes the current bunch of players with the exception of Given are rubbish ... some have talent - Duff, Keane, O'Shea -- but !!!!
If someone better than Kerr had come in I could understand , but to get the Walsall assistant , takes some doing.
We are seriously lacking leadership and a spine , like in the golden days of Roy Keane, townsend, Moran, McGrath, Whelan ,Houghton .
Roll on club football next weekend

eirebhoy

I thought Duff played well last night considering he was been marked by 3 players as he's our only creative force.

The Rooster

Whether Stan is any good or not, nobody knows yet (which admittedly makes its a stupid decision to appoint him). However, now that he's in the job he deserves a chance.

Slating him for losing 1-0 away to a decent German side, and that goal being a lucky deflection, is pure nonsense.

I would agree with the criticism of his interviews. A few too many "magnificents" afterwards, but I suppose he was still hyped up. His pre-match RTE interview annoyed me more when he refused to answer who would play right side of midfield.

eirebhoy

I don't understand people saying we should have lost 4 nil. They had 1 or 2 decent chances, one which Given superbly saved and the other hit the bar. Obviously there's going to be other shots otherwise football would be a pretty boring game. Robbie Keane should have scored for us after a minute and Dunne should have scored in the final minute.

German TV try to avoid showing replays of the opposition's chances for some reason which is why we didn't get to see a replay of Dunne's chance. Showing 40 replays of their chances and none of ours is obviously going to make them look better. Having Eamonn Dunphy call it a shambles is also going to have some people believing him as I saw in the pub with a few people treating his words as gospel.

The Rooster wrote:

I would agree with the criticism of his interviews. A few too many "magnificents" afterwards, but I suppose he was still hyped up. His pre-match RTE interview annoyed me more when he refused to answer who would play right side of midfield.

I'd say the reason he announced his team the night before was to confuse the German's as they certainly wouldn't have expected Reid to start on the right. I think he probably would have been better announcing his team and changing it at the last minute though.

DaveH

Superdub2 wrote:

while Mc Carthy had Keane to constantly save his bacon Staunton doesnt have that and his two best outfield players in Robbie Keane and Duff didnt perform. as for duff that guy seems to be going backwards

I have to completely agree with that comment, particularly about duff. Duff wasnt getting a game last season at Chelsea and he ends up at Newcastle...a real go no where club. A big question mark hangs over Duff.

Also McCarthy had Keane no so much to just save his bacon. We were lucky really that our one class player, played in a position were he could dominate the match.

The Brian Kerr defence starts now as well I've read, im not going to get into it, but between 1986-2002 we finished 2nd in our qualifing groups. Under Kerr we finished 3rd and 4th.
Now back to the current Ireland team. We dont have the players and thats it really, its gonna be a struggle for the next 4-6 years, no matter who is manager.
Harte should be in the team imo. People will give out and his defending isnt that great but he's about the same level as Steve Carr. He also gives us the free Kicks.
After that.eh! We have no central midfield. I wouldnt have O'Shea in the team. He's been around since 2003 but he has never produced it for Ireland. I cant remember one game were he stood out.
Steven Reid is a good player but I dont think he's up to international.
Andy Reid is a waster imo. Kilbane...limited player gives 100% all the time though. Already spoke about Duff.
Miller and Ireland untested at this level. Kav...just a digger.
I cant really think of anyone else.

eirebhoy

DaveH wrote:

I have to completely agree with that comment, particularly about duff. Duff wasnt getting a game last season at Chelsea and he ends up at Newcastle...a real go no where club. A big question mark hangs over Duff.

He had a chance to go to Liverpool, Spurs, Inter or Valencia. It's not as if Newcastle was his only option and if he's enjoying his football at Newcastle then it can only be good for us.

zAbbo

Did anyone see him standing behind the reporter pre match interview with Ray Haughton, trying to put him off, what a clown.

Bateman

eirebhoy wrote:

He had a chance to go to Liverpool, Spurs, Inter or Valencia. It's not as if Newcastle was his only option and if he's enjoying his football at Newcastle then it can only be good for us.

Unfortunately when as evil a force as Pat Devlin is controlling your career, the word "choice" is relative.

LostinBlanch

eirebhoy wrote:

I thought Duff played well last night considering he was been marked by 3 players as he's our only creative force.

But he seems to be going backwards confidence wise. maybe a good run for Newcastle might do him (and us) a load of good. I wouldn't have taken him off for McGeady. Leaving him on would still mean that the Germans would have three men marking him, giving McGeady space, provided he was given the ball! There were a couple of times that he was free and he didn't get the ball. He could have put the ball into the box. The only players I felt sorry for were Given and Doyle - both played their hearts out.

Still on a lighter note, it's a pity that Given didn't manage to do a Smeichel for the corner in the final minutes. Now that would have been magnificent.

ctrl-alt-delete

I wouldn't be too hard on duff - i mean he was surrounded by 2 or 3 german players everytime he got decent possession. In my opinion the ball wasn't released to him enough either (although we didn't have too much of it anyway). He was pissed off to be taken off and i agree with the above post that when mcgeady came on, duff should still have been. Duff needs to be played on the left for us to get the best from him and for him himself to produce what he is capable of.

kevin doyle was my irish man of the match, a really great game from him. The energy and effort he put in should be an example to the rest of the squad. It is a pity he couldn't play a true centre forward role against germany, he had to keep coming deep to recieve the ball - and at times he was alone.

Robbie keane is transferring his spurs coaching to his irish game, he drops way too deep and wide at times to be a serious goal threat.

S Reid is a great player, i have seen him dominate midfield numerous times with blackburn (different level i know) but he needs to be at least played in his best position (MC) for him to produce his best.

and to stay on topic,

Staunton obviosuly isn't an international manager, but he has to be given a decent chance for whatever reason the fai decided to choose him (be it monetary or best of a bad bunch of applicants). I don't know how much of a say Bobby Robson has had to date, or how much he will have in the future, but if he is not coming back - i think the FAI will need to go back to their drawing board.

patmac

thebaz wrote:

Why was Kerr dumped to be replaced by Stan ?
Yes the current bunch of players with the exception of Given are rubbish ... some have talent - Duff, Keane, O'Shea -- but !!!!
If someone better than Kerr had come in I could understand , but to get the Walsall assistant , takes some doing.
We are seriously lacking leadership and a spine , like in the golden days of Roy Keane, townsend, Moran, McGrath, Whelan ,Houghton .
Roll on club football next weekend

In Stan's defence I thought the team played with a passion that was distinctly lacking under Brian Kerr so it was an improvement there, his complete lack of inexperience told against him on the touchline so it was a pity Robson wasn't in the dugout to give him advice. Remember Germany population 80m Ireland 4m, how many would have taken a 1-0 defeat before the game? We were never going to pick up points here, its vital we beat the cypriots, Slovakia seem to have improved. So give Father Dougal a chance.

boy_wonder

Was at the game and am suffering today.

Being at the game(any game for that matter) you can see an awful lot more than what the TV shows. You can learn an awful lot about a player and his performance by watching him off the ball.

Robbie Keane was a disgrace. Nothing but a whinger and we lost count of how many times he was chasing the referee over a decision instead of chasing back to win the ball back.

Duff didnt look interested. Seemed to have his head down the majority of the time and we got the impression that he didnt want to be there.

Given usual solid self. Made a great save from podolski in 1st half and the other straight at him.

Our man of the match(apart from frings) was Richie dunne. Absolute rock at the back and always performs in the bigger games. Strip Keane of captaincy and give it to him.

One lad beside us said after about 15 mins that Stan was going to get himself sent off if he kept it up. I only seen about 2/3 tantrums but was more of them i was told. Absolutely stupid!!!! Not there to make the substitutions etc

thebaz

What annoys me the most is that, we have had the showdown in Saipan, Genesis , various supposed FAI purges , and then a supposed forward thinking official in the job, i.e. Delaney, and what do we end up with --- sacking Kerr for the Walsall assistant manager -- while no Irish manager in my memory have been particularly media freindly, Stan comes across as thorny and amateurish ... instead of things getting better after Saipan and Genesis , the whole thing has got worse ... maybe if Roy is a sucess at Sunderland , he can perform another miracle.

The_B_Man

thats the theory me da subscribes to. Stan is only a placeholder til Keane get a bitta experience into him.