Olympic Qualifiers

MrJoeSoap · 10-03-2012 5:47pm #1

Congratulations to Ireland on their 6-1 win over Russia in the Olympic qualifiers today in UCD. Another game tomorrow against the Ukraine and victory is essential, as we play the world number six, Korea, on Tuesday.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/sport/ireland-get-perfect-start-in-hockey-qualifiers-543050.html

curly from cork · 10-03-2012 10:40pm

I was in Belfield today . Great to see such a big crowd. The Irish lads were fantastic. Tues is sold out I believe but live streaming of every match available. For more info go to
www.hockey.ie

Borders no.2 · 11-03-2012 1:45am

Very interested in how this goes, have a passing interest in the sport but would like to see more of it on the telly, or even a bit of a round up on it, knew these championships were coming up but didn't know it was on today.

Surely there is enough interest to have at least the big 2 games on. I remember the European women's Championship back around 2005(approx) being on rte 2. Was interesting to watch and got decent viewership at the time I thought.

I'm not the most knowledgeable but do we realistically have much of a chance of qualifying?

dragonkin · 11-03-2012 4:09pm

I'd say this is our best chance of qualifying as the team is very prepared and has a lot of semi-professional players who play in Europe. The final will be on RTE if Ireland qualify. The three final games will be on Setanta as well.

Have a look at hookhockey if you're interested as that will have the best coverage. He is also doing live twitter updates of the matches

Faddymackshyte · 15-03-2012 5:50pm

curly from cork wrote: »

Tues is sold out I believe but live streaming of every match available. For more info go to
www.hockey.ie

It's really lame that they charge you to watch the stream though.

curly from cork · 15-03-2012 5:53pm

Im sitting here enjoying the matches. €12 seems ok to me for the whole tournament. I did hear a good few student s saying they thought the daily tickets too dear for them, not sure how much they were but I thought that was a pity as they were hockey playing students from UCD.

MrJoeSoap · 16-03-2012 12:32am

3-0 win tonight and it's all going to the last pool game against Malaysia on Saturday. Could hear the screams of the crowd leaving work tonight, sounded like fantastic support. More of the same at the weekend I'm sure.

curly from cork · 17-03-2012 7:36pm

Ireland drew 1 / 1 with Malayisa and go onto the final tomorrow at 4 pm V Korea. It will be live on RTE 2 . A win will see Ireland in the London Olympics.

MrJoeSoap · 18-03-2012 2:25am

curly from cork wrote: »

Ireland drew 1 / 1 with Malayisa and go onto the final tomorrow at 4 pm V Korea. It will be live on RTE 2 . A win will see Ireland in the London Olympics.

Here's hoping!

Borders no.2 · 18-03-2012 2:42am

Looking forward to this tomorrow, haven't got to see any game yet but have followed with interest. Either way I think the Irish team have taken a stride forward with this tournament. Where are Malaysia ranked in the world?

I see the women's team won 5-1 v France today, it would be great if they could keep in contention during the qualifying tournament, could give the sport a big boost.

jimmi10 · 18-03-2012 12:35pm

can't wait for the game today. hopefully this will raise the profile of the sport in this country

curly from cork · 18-03-2012 5:54pm

Malaysia are ranked 13 . Ireland ranked 16 , Korea 6 th . So far at half time the match is 1/ 1 . Ireland are under huge pressure.

JackieChan · 18-03-2012 6:38pm

Ireland lost to Korea 3-2. With the Koreans getting the winning score a few seconds from the end of the game!

Fantastic performance from the Irish though over the whole week to be in with a chance.

curly from cork · 18-03-2012 6:59pm

totally gutted for the lads. conceded the winning goal with 7 seconds on the clock . sickener .

jimmi10 · 18-03-2012 7:15pm

Very disappointed that it had to end like this today. Great effort from the lads throughout the tournament though.

Truman Burbank · 18-03-2012 7:20pm

Is that 'it' for them???

(sick in bed and the stupid RTE Player wouldn't feed the match, had been waitin all week for it! Thanks for the updates everyone.)

DEFTLEFTHAND · 18-03-2012 7:26pm

I'm not a hockey man but I thoroughly enjoyed watching today, I found the game fast paced skillful and exiting and will definitely be taking more of an interest in it from here on. It was desperately disappointing at the end of course, really rounds off a bad weekend for Irish sport.:(

curly from cork · 18-03-2012 8:03pm

Truman Burbank wrote: »

Is that 'it' for them???

Afraid so .. Europeans in 2 years. It really was the last chance saloon for a few of the older lads on the team.
As a positive I think it has improved public awareness of the game of hockey. Still a minority sport but we ll get there !!

garbanzo · 18-03-2012 9:01pm

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

I'm not a hockey man but I thoroughly enjoyed watching today, I found the game fast paced skillful and exiting and will definitely be taking more of an interest in it from here on. It was desperately disappointing at the end of course, really rounds off a bad weekend for Irish sport.:(

Plus 1 DEFTLEFTHAND.

Will shout for an Irish team in anything. Was really impressed with the performance and attitude of the Irish lads. Gutted for them, sport can be so so cruel.

Truman Burbank · 18-03-2012 9:12pm

curly from cork wrote: »

Truman Burbank wrote: »

Is that 'it' for them???

Afraid so .. Europeans in 2 years. It really was the last chance saloon for a few of the older lads on the team.
As a positive I think it has improved public awareness of the game of hockey. Still a minority sport but we ll get there !!

Thanks for that. Terrible for them. Sounds like they were playin Arsenal :eek:

losthorizon · 19-03-2012 3:47pm

What a great game to watch!. Heart breaking stuff.

I notice the Womens team have won all their games so far and are playing Mexico in their next match and they should beat them so we might yet have a team in the 2012 Olympics. The final to the womens qualifiers is being shown on Eurosport next Saturday.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_field_hockey_Qualifying_Tournaments_for_the_2012_Summer_Olympics

pandaboy · 20-03-2012 5:49pm

It was upsetting to see the lads lose in such a way but they did us proud and there's plenty more to come. the style of play has changed so much and our game is a whole lot faster than previous years. It was also great to see the lads that I used to play with representing our country. Very sorry to see Conor Harte injured, he truly is a fine defender and I think he could have made the difference on the day.. McConnell was brilliant as always.

We've improved so much since our last OQs against Japan and I really think we have a great chance of qualifying next time round. The IHA has really changed its game when it comes to development and it's great to see the U21's in action again.

pandaboy · 20-03-2012 5:51pm

I didn't like the fact that Night at the Museum took precedence over the hockey on RTE tv.

curly from cork · 23-03-2012 6:36pm

RTÉ Sport has confirmed it will broadcast live coverage of the Irish Women’s Hockey Olympic Qualifier Final against Belgium this Sunday 25th March. Coverage will begin at 3.20pm on RTÉ One, with updates and live reports from the match also available on RTÉ Radio 1 Sunday Sport and RTÉ.ie. Peter Collins will be joined in studio for analysis by Joe Brennan with commentary from Ger Canning and Graham Shaw.

Time to cheer on the Ladies now !

Olympic Qualifiers

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