Republic of Ireland Team Talk/News/Rumours 2018/19

noodler

weldoninhio wrote: »

The Euros was pure luck on O'Neills part, right time right place. Finish third and still qualify because they padded out the main competition. You make it sound like we romped to qualification. Below are our qualification finishes going back to 1988. O'Neill finished joint worst with 2004 and 2008, with a third place finish and people still want to make him out as some messiah who's changed Ireland's footballing fortunes.

2016 we finished 3rd.
2012 we finished 2nd.
2008 we finished 3rd.
2004 we finished 3rd.
2000 we finished 2nd.
1996 we finished 2nd.
1992 we finished 2nd.
1988 we topped the group.

Its a fair point. The Germany game did paper over disappointing home draws and losses in Scotland and Poland.


However, credit has to be given for Bosnia though. They were a really solid team we knocked out in the playoffs. Would have been favourites.

And obviously, this campaign, although we blew first, has been an improvement again overall.

weldoninhio

noodler wrote: »

Its a fair point. The Germany game did paper over disappointing home draws and losses in Scotland and Poland.


However, credit has to be given for Bosnia though. They were a really solid team we knocked out in the playoffs. Would have been favourites.

And obviously, this campaign, although we blew first, has been an improvement again overall.

I don't know about that. The Georgia game is one of the worst Irish performances I've ever seen. Austria home, we sat back and invited pressure. Once we needed a goal, you could see that Austria were no great shakes and if we'd gone for it from the start we would have beaten them, then you've 20 mins vs a 10 man Wales and Serbia and we took 1 point out of 6 from them.

TheCitizen

weldoninhio wrote: »

The Euros was pure luck on O'Neills part, right time right place. Finish third and still qualify because they padded out the main competition. You make it sound like we romped to qualification. Below are our qualification finishes going back to 1988. O'Neill finished joint worst with 2004 and 2008, with a third place finish and people still want to make him out as some messiah who's changed Ireland's footballing fortunes.

2016 we finished 3rd.
2012 we finished 2nd.
2008 we finished 3rd.
2004 we finished 3rd.
2000 we finished 2nd.
1996 we finished 2nd.
1992 we finished 2nd.
1988 we topped the group.

When we got to the Euros we performed well did we not, or was that pure luck as well:rolleyes:

So giving credit where it's due to MON is making him out to be a messiah? Hyperbolic nonsense out of ya.

TheCitizen

weldoninhio wrote: »

I don't know about that. The Georgia game is one of the worst Irish performances I've ever seen. Austria home, we sat back and invited pressure. Once we needed a goal, you could see that Austria were no great shakes and if we'd gone for it from the start we would have beaten them, then you've 20 mins vs a 10 man Wales and Serbia and we took 1 point out of 6 from them.

You said all that before we went to Cardiff and sealed the play off spot. The carping stopped for a day or two but you're back in full swing again aren't ya. If we win tonight you'll disappear again until the next poor performance or even under par performance that doesn't result in a win. Boring negative carping tripe out of ya.

TheCitizen

weldoninhio wrote: »

So you expect us to have 68% possession tonight?? Have 5 times more passes than Denmark tonight?? Or do you not know what going toe to toe means??

I expect us to take the initiative to take the game to Denmark in a similar way as we did v Bosnia in Dublin two years ago. If we get the first goal, then they'll come out and yes at that point it will be toe to toe on the night.

Adamocovic

Of course worried about tonight.

Working with an Italian and a Greek and we normally watch the games, we we're delighted we all avoided each other in the draw saying now we can all qualify for it. They've both missed out now and I'm hoping it's not a sign of things to come for us:P

Going to be a very tense 90 minutes (or more) of football.

weldoninhio

TheCitizen wrote: »

When we got to the Euros we performed well did we not, or was that pure luck as well:rolleyes:

So giving credit where it's due to MON is making him out to be a messiah? Hyperbolic nonsense out of ya.

Again, it was luck. Again, it was right time right place. How many other tournaments did the 3rd place out of 4 qualify for the next round??

weldoninhio

TheCitizen wrote: »

You said all that before we went to Cardiff and sealed the play off spot. The carping stopped for a day or two but you're back in full swing again aren't ya. If we win tonight you'll disappear again until the next poor performance or even under par performance that doesn't result in a win. Boring negative carping tripe out of ya.

:rolleyes::rolleyes: Facts are facts. If you can't counter them with anything other than cheap personal shots, you don't really have an argument do ya??

TheCitizen

weldoninhio wrote: »

Again, it was luck. Again, it was right time right place. How many other tournaments did the 3rd place out of 4 qualify for the next round??

The competition stipulated that a 3rd place side got a play off. They got 3rd and got a play off, they deserved their play off and then won the play off and then performed well in the Euros itself. Christ you're a bitter sort.

TheCitizen

weldoninhio wrote: »

:rolleyes::rolleyes: Facts are facts. If you can't counter them with anything other than cheap personal shots, you don't really have an argument do ya??

Facts are they went to Cardiff and sealed a play off when the negative types like you on here were writing them off. If we qualify tonight it will be an added bonus that hyperbolic negative ninnies like you will have to shut it for a while.

weldoninhio

TheCitizen wrote: »

The competition stipulated that a 3rd place side got a play off. They got 3rd and got a play off, they deserved their play off and then won the play off and then performed well in the Euros itself. Christ you're a bitter sort.

Which backs up my "right time, right place" statement. Otherwise we would have gotten to the play offs in every Euros since 1988, and with a few lucky draws would have qualified for more.

We came 3rd in our group in the Euro's too, scraping past an uninterested second string Italy team who had already qualified, which again was lucky.

kfallon

Sorry to be off topic but is the ticketmaster van for ticket collection still at the junction of Northumberland Road and Lansdowne Road?

kfallon

kfallon wrote: »

Sorry to be off topic but is the ticketmaster van for ticket collection still at the junction of Northumberland Road and Lansdowne Road?

I remember it being there for the Austria game

weldoninhio

TheCitizen wrote: »

Facts are they went to Cardiff and sealed a play off when the negative types like you on here were writing them off. If we qualify tonight it will be an added bonus that hyperbolic negative ninnies like you will have to shut it for a while.

Win, lose or draw tonight will not change any of the facts. This was a group that we could, and should have topped. O'Neill shot us in the foot from a very promising position.

Win and we go to the World Cup, we might scrape out of the group we might not, it'll be down to the luck of the draw.

Draw or lose and we are out, which will 100% be on O'Neill and Keane.

And come the next Euro qualifying campaign, we'll play the same backs to the wall, hit and hope, bypass the midfield garbage we played this campaign and eventually our luck will run out.

You might be happy with that, i'm not.

weldoninhio

kfallon wrote: »

Sorry to be off topic but is the ticketmaster van for ticket collection still at the junction of Northumberland Road and Lansdowne Road?

Yeah as far as I can remember.

alta stare

TheCitizen wrote: »

Facts are they went to Cardiff and sealed a play off when the negative types like you on here were writing them off. If we qualify tonight it will be an added bonus that hyperbolic negative ninnies like you will have to shut it for a while.

To be fair we had automatic qualification in our own hands and we messed that up and any person who is annoyed frustrated angry at that have a right to air their views without the idiocy of being called negative.

It is natural for people to vent their anger and frustration at MON and the way we play. Personally i think if he wasnt so cautious against teams we know we are better than we wouldnt be in this playoff. I agree against the big teams be cautious but MON is cautious all of the time.

I hope we win i fear we wont, that cant be called negativity, i mean perhaps some people can be said to be blinkered or away with the fairies bit the fact of the matter is MON and the players messed up this campaign after a good start. Collectively it will be their fault if we dont qualify and there is no calling some fans negative just because their call out the manager.

I felt we needed two goals over there to win the tie as i felt Denmark will score here and now i feel we need to score two tonight which seems like a million miles away from happening, of course it could happen i pray it does so and i reckon yhe players will go at it tonight so COYBIG.

Adamocovic

weldoninhio wrote: »

Win, lose or draw tonight will not change any of the facts. This was a group that we could, and should have topped. O'Neill shot us in the foot from a very promising position.

Win and we go to the World Cup, we might scrape out of the group we might not, it'll be down to the luck of the draw.

Draw or lose and we are out, which will 100% be on O'Neill and Keane.

And come the next Euro qualifying campaign, we'll play the same backs to the wall, hit and hope, bypass the midfield garbage we played this campaign and eventually our luck will run out.

You might be happy with that, i'm not.

I've had my complaints and criticisms about O'Neil, obviously most fans will about their manager at times. I agree with you that the team and himself had gotten us into a great position but then looked to squander it, did manage to beat out Wales to earn back the playoff in the long run.

However I do find it rich that if we do qualify tonight it's all down to luck in your eyes, and if we lose then it's all down to O'Neill and Keane. Really is a no win situation for them in terms of your opinion.

I'm sceptical of tonight and am not feeling the most confident but if we do manage to qualify for the World Cup O'Neill will become only the second ever manager in our history to bring us to both the World Cup and the Euros, and regardless of how much luck you attribute that to, or changed formats, surely he will have to gain some respect for such a feat.

weldoninhio

Adamocovic wrote: »

I've had my complaints and criticisms about O'Neil, obviously most fans will about their manager at times. I agree with you that the team and himself had gotten us into a great position but then looked to squander it, did manage to beat out Wales to earn back the playoff in the long run.

However I do find it rich that if we do qualify tonight it's all down to luck in your eyes, and if we lose then it's all down to O'Neill and Keane. Really is a no win situation for them in terms of your opinion.

I'm sceptical of tonight and am not feeling the most confident but if we do manage to qualify for the World Cup O'Neill will become only the second ever manager in our history to bring us to both the World Cup and the Euros, and regardless of how much luck you attribute that to, or changed formats, surely he will have to gain some respect for such a feat.

Perhaps re-read the post you quoted. I said if we win and go through we might get out of the WC group based on the luck of the draw.

If we go through tonight, we'll have done what we should have based on the group we were in, and qualified, but we'll have done it the hard way, due to our tactics in the qualifying stages.

Guffy

Adamocovic wrote: »

I've had my complaints and criticisms about O'Neil, obviously most fans will about their manager at times. I agree with you that the team and himself had gotten us into a great position but then looked to squander it, did manage to beat out Wales to earn back the playoff in the long run.

However I do find it rich that if we do qualify tonight it's all down to luck in your eyes, and if we lose then it's all down to O'Neill and Keane. Really is a no win situation for them in terms of your opinion.

I'm sceptical of tonight and am not feeling the most confident but if we do manage to qualify for the World Cup O'Neill will become only the second ever manager in our history to bring us to both the World Cup and the Euros, and regardless of how much luck you attribute that to, or changed formats, surely he will have to gain some respect for such a feat.

Tbf i think he meant luck of the draw if we are to progress from the group stage at the wc if we were to get there.

Bridge93

We were at best the third strongest team in the group. It's a group we could have won but not should have won. Serbia Wales and probably Austria have better players than us. Our results are a result of us being greater than the sum of our parts which is a result of playing ugly boring football.

pjohnson

Austria disgraced themselves in that campaign.

johnpatrick81

pjohnson wrote: »

Austria disgraced themselves in that campaign.

We can take a lot of thanks for that. Beating them in Vienna was a massive result.

johnpatrick81

johnpatrick81 wrote: »

We can take a lot of thanks for that. Beating them in Vienna was a massive result.

Drawing to them at home was an awful result

johnpatrick81

M!Ck^ wrote: »

Drawing to them at home was an awful result

Christ you're a half glass empty kinda guy aren't you.

And no, it was not an awful result. They are a higher seed than us, we took 4 points off them, they took 1. Get a grip.

smelly sock

M!Ck^ wrote: »

Drawing to them at home was an awful result

Anytime you beat a higher ranked team away from home its a massive result. There are no exceptions to that.

pjohnson

M!Ck^ wrote: »

Drawing to them at home was an awful result

Shame we were on about the away result. Still guess its a cheap way to get a whinge in.

Rekop dog

Whatever the result the Thanks Martin. Thanks Roy thread should be bumped circa 9:30 tonight for their phenomenal efforts over this campaign.

DeanAustin

TheCitizen wrote: »

The point I'm picking up Duff on was he suggested that under Trap we weren't as bad with possession. Overall we were worse under Trap in every way than under MON, a hell of a lot worse. Even when we qualified with Trap we could beat no-one ranked higher than us and when we got to the Euros we were by a distance the worst team in the tournament, in every facet of the game including use of the ball. Duff was talking utter dung.

Dunphy I used to find entertaining years ago but he's become stale and out of touch and yes he always talked nonsense but him and Brady rule the roost on that panel now and the other panelist's don't last long in the gig if they disagree with them. That's why Damian won't disagree with them.

Brady used to have staged rows with Dunphy, and Giles played the part of the sensible one settling their faux disputes. Nowadays though it's just a washed out old boys act with Brady and Dunphy and they round on anyone who disagrees with them and get rid of them or shout them down.

Here's a good article by Eamonn Sweeney in yesterday's Irish Independent where he reveals the default position of Irish pundits on RTE to generally be overly critical of Irish managers.
https://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/world-cup/eamonn-sweeney-mindless-scepticism-becoming-a-ritual-for-tv-pundits-36313316.html

Brady of course had a different view on Trap though because he was an old pal of his and Duff talking gibberish about Trap's time while devaluing MON's side as well just to be in agreement with Brady. The RTE panel as it currently stands has been entirely reduced to an old pals act and anyone who wants to get a gig needs to chime in with the two dinosaur pundits Brady and Dunphy.

I actually thought we were even worse in possession the other night than in any of Trap’s games. Not saying we weren’t dire or didn’t play the long ball under Trap but it didn’t seem to be “just hoof it anywhere”. Usually, with the long ball, you’ll play it into an area where there’s a good chance your centre forward might be or where it’ll take the opposition a bit of time to get the ball and you have a chance to regroup. It’s pretty agricultural stuff but can work.

The other night, for the first time I can recall, we had numerous occasions where we didn’t even look for those options or give it any thought before hoofing it. It was literally just swing a leg at it. When we had the ball, it was like watching a badly coached under 12 team.

smelly sock

Rekop dog wrote: »

Whatever the result the Thanks Martin. Thanks Roy thread should be bumped circa 9:30 tonight for their phenomenal efforts over this campaign.

Im not sure. The failure / success comes down to tonight. Lets not forget we were in a strong position to qualify automatically at one point.

Rekop dog

smelly sock wrote: »

Im not sure. The failure / success comes down to tonight. Lets not forget we were in a strong position to qualify automatically at one point.

Only because they had us punching miles above our weight as 4th seeds.

TheCitizen

DeanAustin wrote: »

I actually thought we were even worse in possession the other night than in any of Trap’s games. Not saying we weren’t dire or didn’t play the long ball under Trap but it didn’t seem to be “just hoof it anywhere”. Usually, with the long ball, you’ll play it into an area where there’s a good chance your centre forward might be or where it’ll take the opposition a bit of time to get the ball and you have a chance to regroup. It’s pretty agricultural stuff but can work.

The other night, for the first time I can recall, we had numerous occasions where we didn’t even look for those options or give it any thought before hoofing it. It was literally just swing a leg at it. When we had the ball, it was like watching a badly coached under 12 team.

I don't know where to even start with this.

We have played worse in terms of use of the ball under MON himself in recent times than we did last Saturday night.

What I'm saying is overall under MON v Trap we have been more positive and we've consistently beat teams higher ranked than us which we never did under Trap bar that time in Paris when you could argue we won 1-0 over 90 minutes but ended up not qualifying anyway. Also when we qualified for the Euros with MON we went there and played good football with the monkey of qualification off our backs. It was the opposite with Trap when we froze and were the worst team in the tournament. It was desperate stuff with Trap.

At times with MON we should/could be better on the ball, but at times we do play good football under MON and a hell of a lot more often than we ever did under Trap.

pjohnson

pjohnson wrote: »

Shame we were on about the away result. Still guess its a cheap way to get a whinge in.

Well I'm on about the home result. Get over it.

pjohnson

M!Ck^ wrote: »

Well I'm on about the home result. Get over it.

Well done

pjohnson

pjohnson wrote: »

Well done

Cheers

Adamocovic

weldoninhio wrote: »

Perhaps re-read the post you quoted. I said if we win and go through we might get out of the WC group based on the luck of the draw.

Apologies.

If we go through tonight, we'll have done what we should have based on the group
we were in, and qualified, but we'll have done it the hard way, due to our
tactics in the qualifying stages.

At the time people thought we had a favourable group as Wales were not rated highly since this was before their exploits in the Euros. We did enter the draw as 4th seeds for a reason so I wouldn't have taken the group for granted, Serbia being tough fixture and Austria after just beating us during the previous WC qualifying.

Surely if we manage to get to the WC today, a big if, O'Neill and Keane are due a lot of praise for managing to get us there, even if you feel it has been the hard way.

We squandered a great position, but I have to give them credit for the recovery and getting the playoff spot at the end.
I don't know how my nerves will hold up tonight however, I imagine uncomfortable, cagey football. Mad to think it's been 15 years since we last played in a world cup.

Adamocovic

TheCitizen wrote: »

I
What I'm saying is overall under MON v Trap we have been more positive and we've consistently beat teams higher ranked than us which we never did under Trap bar that time in Paris when you could argue we won 1-0 over 90 minutes but ended up not qualifying anyway.

Could be wrong here, but did Given recently come out and say that during that game the players themselves decided to throw a defensive style out the window and just play.

Maybe we need something inspirational like that today :P

smelly sock

Rekop dog wrote: »

Only because they had us punching miles above our weight as 4th seeds.

Drew against Georgia away, Couldnt beat serbia,wales or austria at home.

Dont get me wrong im not knocking them but i think if we dont qualify tonight the campaign has been a massive failure after the position we were in.

brilou23

smelly sock wrote: »

Drew against Georgia away, Couldnt beat serbia,wales or austria at home.

Dont get me wrong im not knocking them but i think if we dont qualify tonight the campaign has been a massive failure after the position we were in.

That time we played Austria at home they had left half the team at home.

Rekop dog

smelly sock wrote: »

Drew against Georgia away, Couldnt beat serbia,wales or austria at home.

Dont get me wrong im not knocking them but i think if we dont qualify tonight the campaign has been a massive failure after the position we were in.

We weren't just dropped in that position magically. It was result of some extremely shrewd management in the first place. You can't discredit that. The only poor result over the campaign was Gerogia. Every other result ranged from acceptable to excellent based on relative strength of sides.

tayto lover

Rekop dog wrote: »

We weren't just dropped in that position magically. It was result of some extremely shrewd management in the first place. You can't discredit that. The only poor result over the campaign was Gerogia. Every other result ranged from acceptable to excellent based on relative strength of sides.

I think we gave Wales too much respect in the Aviva and sat back. Even with the extra man at the end we didn't push on and seemed to fear conceding instead of trying to score.
The Austria match we were poor in and very poor against Serbia.
So what we built up we then destroyed.

smelly sock

Rekop dog wrote: »

We weren't just dropped in that position magically. It was result of some extremely shrewd management in the first place. You can't discredit that. The only poor result over the campaign was Gerogia. Every other result ranged from acceptable to excellent based on relative strength of sides.

Beating Wales amd Austria away was fantastic. Great game management etc. The result at home to Wales , serbia amd Austria was an example of poor management.

Tonight we need to be a bit more expansive , adventurous amd creative. Is Martin capable of producing a game plan like that. I think so. He hasnt shown it so far bit tonight might be different.

tayto lover

tayto lover wrote: »

I think we gave Wales too much respect in the Aviva and sat back. Even with the extra man at the end we didn't push on and seemed to fear conceding instead of trying to score.
The Austria match we were poor in and very poor against Serbia.
So what we built up we then destroyed.

Exactly. MON reverted to fearing the opposition once we were in a winning position in the group.

TheCitizen

Adamocovic wrote: »

Could be wrong here, but did Given recently come out and say that during that game the players themselves decided to throw a defensive style out the window and just play.

Maybe we need something inspirational like that today :P

Yep that's what Given said.

If we need to play expansive football tonight we will under MON, we have done before under MON on several occasions, that seems to be conveniently forgotten about with a certain lot on here. They forget about the performances and positive play in games like Italy, Sweden, France and Bosnia but have a perfect recollection of the poor display in Tblisi.

Tonight, I think we'll go on the front foot like we did v Bosnia in Dublin two years ago. There won't need to be a mutiny. MON and his team are capable of taking their courage in their hands and playing positive football especially when it's most required. We've done it several times under him since he has taken over as manager of Ireland. Some posters around here seem to need constant reminding of that.

asteroids over berlin

Put em under pressure, doo noo noo nu noo noo no

pjohnson

https://www.premierleague.com/news/511787

Talking Tactics featured Duffy yesterday

TheCitizen

smelly sock wrote: »

Beating Wales amd Austria away was fantastic. Great game management etc. The result at home to Wales , serbia amd Austria was an example of poor management.

Tonight we need to be a bit more expansive , adventurous amd creative. Is Martin capable of producing a game plan like that. I think so. He hasnt shown it so far bit tonight might be different.

Is that a typo? You mean he has shown it so far, on several occasions as Ireland manager.

smelly sock

TheCitizen wrote: »

Is that a typo? You mean he has shown it so far, on several occasions as Ireland manager.

When?

smelly sock

TheCitizen wrote: »

Is that a typo? You mean he has shown it so far, on several occasions as Ireland manager.

So far in this group I mean.

TheCitizen

smelly sock wrote: »

When?

Bosnia, Italy, Sweden, France...

johnpatrick81

johnpatrick81 wrote: »

Christ you're a half glass empty kinda guy aren't you.

And no, it was not an awful result. They are a higher seed than us, we took 4 points off them, they took 1. Get a grip.

We were at home to half the Austria team. A combination of both poor team selection and tactical inept led us to not winning at home.

The minute Wes came on the pitch he almost created a goal.
We set the precedence early on in the match that we didn't want any creativity or actual productive play. Only after we conceded he reverted to a 4-4-2 and actual brought on someone who can play a bit of ball.

He opted to take off Harry Arthur when he was actually having a decent game and left on Whelan. Another baffling decision.