Republic of Ireland Team Talk/News/Rumours 2020/2021 - see Mod Note in OP [18/11/20]

noodler

Vicxas wrote: »

It's nice to see players actually look like they want to play for Ireland

They always look like they want to play for Ireland.

Without fail, it's the one thing we can always rely on.

bazza1

Lets kick on and thrash Luxembourg 1-0

ScummyMan

The babies in the match thread were unreal. Never going into one of them again.

Lots of positives to take from that, thought Cullen was excellent. Being down to our third choice keeper ultimately cost us.

ShamoBuc

Really looking forward to the next game. Been a while since I was able to say that.

artanevilla

The fact that we've come out of the match disappointed rather than depressed shows that we are going in the right direction.

Citizenpain

ScummyMan wrote: »

The babies in the match thread were unreal. Never going into one of them again.

Lots of positives to take from that, thought Cullen was excellent. Being down to our third choice keeper ultimately cost us.

They only came out when we went 2-1 down funnily enough . I enjoyed a lot of that game while at the same time looking at it though my fingers for large chunks.
There was a sense of inevitability,,, but great to be in it with mins to go for a change

athlone99

An inexperienced keeper away i think from getting a result.

I think the last 15 mins showed mcclean, hendrick and brady are not good enoigh anymore.

Cullen and robinson had great games. To me Cullen should have the 6 position locked down after tonight.

Build on this Saturday and its not the worst start

noodler

athlone99 wrote: »

An inexperienced keeper away i think from getting a result.

I think the last 15 mins showed mcclean, hendrick and brady are not good enoigh anymore.

Cullen and robinson had great games. To me Cullen should have the 6 position locked down after tonight.

Build on this Saturday and its not the worst start

I don't see how the last 15 showed that tbf. It may be an opinion you hold but not sure it was evidenced in the last 15.

You probably would have added Long to that list of he hadn't scored I take it

athlone99

noodler wrote: »

I don't see how the last 15 showed that tbf. It may be an opinion you hold but not sure it was evidenced in the last 15.

You probably would have added Long to that list of he hadn't scored I take it

Robbie Brady plays for his set piece delivery, didnt beat the 1st man once. McClean for a winger cant cross the ball. Hendrick is just terrible. Shane long offers something different and is worth having on the bench. Thats my opinion, id rather see young lads get a run over the older players, just my opinion

edgecutter

artanevilla wrote: »

The fact that we've come out of the match disappointed rather than depressed shows that we are going in the right direction.

Not even depressed. Normally I would have the game on in the background and I would concentrate on something else, but I thoroughly enjoyed watching the team tonight.

Yeah we are a long way off, but at least we look like we are moving forward.

Citizenpain

athlone99 wrote: »

Robbie Brady plays for his set piece delivery, didnt beat the 1st man once. McClean for a winger cant cross the ball. Hendrick is just terrible. Shane long offers something different and is worth having on the bench. Thats my opinion, id rather see young lads get a run over the older players, just my opinion

McClean Is probably the only one I’d have disagreed with . Hendrick is a premiership player I figure he must offer something more than is obvious to me given the wages he is on . I thought he would stop them playing through Us ... long is a runner and closes down . Collins can score , Brady can cross but I was disappointed he didn’t win any 50/50 balls , wonder is injury still impacting. McLean offers passion but every time he had the ball out wide I was shouting pass don’t cross
Not many other options though and on an other day Connolly gets a penalty and the chip over the keeper goes just over

Dr. Bre

Azerbaijan will take points in this group . Only lost one nil tonight. Early days in group but obviously with only 8 games to be played the margin for error is thin.

tastyt

Have to be positive after that

Any changes for Luxembourg? Can’t really see any obvious ones to be honest . Don’t really have the options to change keeper .

Although wouldn’t surprise me to see Hendrick start ahead of Molumby

~Rebel~

Portugal absolutely poxed to get their win tonight. Hilarious goal. Have to feel sorry for Azerbaijan to lose out on a big point away from home like that.

For our game, thoroughly enjoyed it, loads of positives to take from it.

I think we can firmly say that starting outfield 10 is our best team, or very close to it. Perhaps an argument for Duffy over Clark, but otherwise, they played very well, and played for each other. The midfield especially worked very well, and put together some lovely moves. Hendrick made things demonstrably worse when he came on. Just didn't have Molumby's fight or dynamism. Long and Collins are decent options off the bench, but the rest of the subs removed more than they added. Would have Knight up to first sub in midfield already. Otherwise, we need a better keeper, but sure we knew that before the game started.

I really like us playing with 2 up. From the 4 players that played in those 2 spots (Robinson, Connolly, Long, and Collins), 2 got assists and 1 scored. Hopefully something we stick to.

4goneConclusion

ScummyMan wrote: »

The babies in the match thread were unreal. Never going into one of them again.

Lots of positives to take from that, thought Cullen was excellent. Being down to our third choice keeper ultimately cost us.

Fourth choice i would say as Westwood would have played if fit but yes i agree there was plenty of positives. Overall I'm happy enough.

Francie Barrett

Can we pick a different 23 man squad for Luxembourg than we did for Serbia? Presumably yes?

MisterAnarchy

If Randolph or Kelliher had been fit, we wouldn't have conceded the second or the third goal, keeper badly at fault for both.
The third goal went in about 6 yards from the post.

scouserstation

Not the result we wanted but there are some positives to take away from the game, I thought some players were exceptional tonight Cullen, Molumbay, Browne and Robinson especially other players played well too, its just a couple of schoolboy defensive errors that cost us the game and these were as a result of inexperience for some of our players at this level

square ball

sugarman wrote: »

Obviously disappointed with the result but very happy with the performance, plenty of positives to take from it.

I think there will probably be changes alright with so many of our players playing so little football for their clubs fitness will be a concern.

Molumby, Connolly and Robinson will probably be rested, they done a lot of running and pressing. Hendrick/Knight, Long and Collins to come in.

Cant see him changing keeper, would shatter Travers confidence. He'll learn from it and move on.

Decent performance up to the 60 minute mark. Think we ran out of legs and shape after that. Thought the set up was good. Lacking that bit of quality up front and off the bench was all the difference.

Minor mistake from Travers and 99 times out of 100 you would get away with it. Mitrovic has 38 goal in 62 appearances for his country. I don't think we have that many in the squad. Some quality players in the Serbian squad. Players getting game time all over Europe, I think they could give Portugal a run for top of the group.

I don't think SK could have done much more with players he has. We looked like a team comfortable on the ball that wanted it when we got it back just not enough quality up the field. Nice to see Long have an impact. Omitting him previously was the one thing I could fault SK for, he is still capable of upsetting any defence.

Hoping Brady, Hendrick and McCLean have played their way out of SK's plans after tonight. In fairness they all got opportunities in previous games and took balls from SK to drop our most experienced players after previous results.

The win is still eluding us but we have had the performances, now the goals and Saturday we will have the win too.

showpony1

I wonder why Stephen never tried the 3-5-2 before in any nothing game until this crucial qualifier.

Stephen picked a keeper who made mistakes you'd see down the park in an U16s game, diving out of the way of a header straight at him that any decent keeper would have thrown his cap on.

It was good to see a bit of experience at the end from Long getting us back into it, if we had of had Duffy on at the end we might have got the equalizer but we had nothing in the box.

I feel the team now know there are no expectations anymore, so will be happy enough losing 3-2. I even heard people saying how great it was we scored two away from home - even though the second goal was a bad error with the game already over.

I would like to see the old guard start on saturday - Duffy, Long, McClean, Hendricks, Brady all back in for me.

Kermit.de.frog

Under Trap or Mick we'd have got the point tonight.

Instead we end up with nothing trying to play a style we can't play.

We need to go back to our strengths.

The_Kew_Tour

We played well tonight. That was far better then the lucky draw we got there 4 years ago with poorer side.

We just lack that 2 or 3 players to get to that level required.

I thought they gave it everything and I felt more positives then negatives

Got get 3 points though on Saturday

The_Kew_Tour

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

Under Trap or Mick we'd have got the point tonight.

Instead we end up with nothing trying to play a style we can't play.

We need to go back to our strengths.

Under Mick we lost plenty of games away from home. His record against teams like Serbia away is poor

fullstop

showpony1 wrote: »

I wonder why Stephen never tried the 3-5-2 before in any nothing game until this crucial qualifier.

Stephen picked a keeper who made mistakes you'd see down the park in an U16s game, diving out of the way of a header straight at him that any decent keeper would have thrown his cap on.

It was good to see a bit of experience at the end from Long getting us back into it, if we had of had Duffy on at the end we might have got the equalizer but we had nothing in the box.

Back for another moan about “Stephen”.

Who would you have picked in goals?

I’m just glad Stephen has more ‘time’.

showpony1

fullstop wrote: »

I’m just glad Stephen has more ‘time’.

I know and that's what i feared when Stephen had a 20 minute decent spell which was the equivalent of the league 2 side having a purple patch against a good team in the FA Cup before being put the sword.

I didn't see anything that would suggest to me we will control the game and create chances against Luxembourg on Saturday so it'll be interesting to see the reaction if they come to the Aviva and Dominate Stephen's team.

Hopefully Stephen has the sense to get the experienced heads out there on Saturday but i fear we will see more of the same. How O'Shea is playing over Shane Duffy is beyond me.

showpony1

Ridiculously amateurish stuff from Stephen also going on about how there was no VAR when we all know that before hand. Like someone's aul fella ranting on the sideline in the park.

artanevilla

showpony1 wrote: »

I know and that's what i feared when Stephen had a 20 minute decent spell which was the equivalent of the league 2 side having a purple patch against a good team in the FA Cup before being put the sword.

I didn't see anything that would suggest to me we will control the game and create chances against Luxembourg on Saturday so it'll be interesting to see the reaction if they come to the Aviva and Dominate Stephen's team.

Hopefully Stephen has the sense to get the experienced heads out there on Saturday but i fear we will see more of the same. How O'Shea is playing over Shane Duffy is beyond me.

Regular Premier League starter Dara O'Shea is ahead of a Shane Duffy who recently can't get into arguably the worst Celtic side of the last decade is beyond you?

~Rebel~

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

Under Trap or Mick we'd have got the point tonight.

Instead we end up with nothing trying to play a style we can't play.

We need to go back to our strengths.

We played very well tonight, and it was clearly a style we could play. Serbia are a better team with a huge amount more depth, but it took our (4th choice) keeper messing up to give them an 'in' into the game. Trap or Mick with this squad would probably have lost by a few.

What you think of as our strengths, are not actually our strengths anymore. Somewhat counter-intuitively, you can only get away with that deep defending craftless football if you have some touch of class in the final 3rd. Someone who can make something out of nothing and get you that breakaway goal from very few chances. Or at very least, someone like McGoldrick or Walters who can win the ball, hold it high up the pitch and lay it off. We don't have any of that. And without it, you're looking at a lot of losses, and a few ugly draws here and there at best, and not much else.

Kenny's doing the pragmatic thing with the squad we have, which is to build through quite simple passing and movement to get numbers around their box and craft easier chances closer to goal. There is literally nothing complicated about what they were asked to do - and quite successfully did - tonight.

A better than 4th choice keeper and we get a deserved result.

Honestly, it feels like some posters have Stockholm syndrome from years of being held captive by awful hopeless football.

showpony1

artanevilla wrote: »

Regular Premier League starter Dara O'Shea is ahead of a Shane Duffy who recently can't get into arguably the worst Celtic side of the last decade is beyond you?

To suggest that Shane Duffy is no longer capable of being a regular premier league starter at a club a few points above bottom like the great Dara O'Shea is nonsense.

artanevilla

showpony1 wrote: »

To suggest that Shane Duffy is no longer capable of being a regular premier league starter at a club a few points above bottom like the great Dara O'Shea is nonsense.

The fact is he was literally no longer capable of getting into a struggling Premier League team and was sent out on loan and is now struggling to get into a Scottish Premier League team. Where's the nonsense there?

Who says Dara O'Shea is great? I think based on recent performances, Shane Duffy is not currently operating at the same level as Dara O'Shea.

Citizenpain

Have to agree , Shane Duffy has been massive for Ireland but on his form this year Kenny made the right choice .
Could have made same argument for Doherty but it just shows how much more comfortable he is at wing back

~Rebel~

artanevilla wrote: »

The fact is he was unable to get into a struggling Premier League team and was sent out on loan and is now struggling to get into a Scottish Premier League team. Where's the nonsense there?

Exactly, I like Duffy, but the days of big tough last ditch defenders who can't play football is past in the PL. He can't even merit a spot in the Brighton squad, let alone first 11, and I daresay won't play in the PL again.

PL defenders - at all levels of the league - need to be reasonably comfortable on the ball now, so they can carry it out of trouble and play a meaningful pass to relieve the pressure. Burnley have the quintessential "tough to break down" style, but Tarkowski and Ben Mee are both really solid with the ball at their feet. Same as Dunk, and White, and Andersen, and Tosin, and O'Shea, and Bartley, and Ajayi and all the other defenders down the bottom end of the league.

He still has his place in the Ireland squad, and hopefully when he's less 'shook' he can break back into our starting 11. But dropping him is far from an obvious mistake. In his most recent starts, he's been conceding goals against St Johnstone, St. Mirren, and Livingston (and he's been dropped entirely for over a month)... I dread to think what the Serb's could have done against him.

fullstop

showpony1 wrote: »

I know and that's what i feared when Stephen had a 20 minute decent spell which was the equivalent of the league 2 side having a purple patch against a good team in the FA Cup before being put the sword.

I didn't see anything that would suggest to me we will control the game and create chances against Luxembourg on Saturday so it'll be interesting to see the reaction if they come to the Aviva and Dominate Stephen's team.

Hopefully Stephen has the sense to get the experienced heads out there on Saturday but i fear we will see more of the same. How O'Shea is playing over Shane Duffy is beyond me.

Who would you have picked in goals? I notice you co conveniently forgot to answer that. If you’re going to have a go about the 4th choice keeper he picked it would be good to hear your solution.

happyoutscan

I enjoyed last night as I wasn't expecting us to win.

I liked the selection and they team were confident in playing football. It was great to hear them telling each other to hold the ball, play the ball instead of lumping it the whole game. There was a confidence

Turning point could have been the penalty that wasn't given, although I think the Serbians quality (the difference in their sub options compared to ours) and a nervous keeper for us would have seen them through anyway.

Anyone who thought we were going to qualify from this group needs a reality check.

As I've said, SK has his philosophy and going on his team selection isn't afraid of doing things his way.

Roll on Saturday and hopefully get a win.

wadacrack

We need some players to start progressing at club level tbh, especially the younger ones ie Molumpy, Idah, Connolly, Parrott. Thers not much more Kenny can get out of this team at the minute. Performances have been much better than with McCarthy and in general play. But we do look far more vulnerable at the back. Thats a problem when we don't have alot of quality upfront. Thought Callum Robinson was our best player tho. He has generally impressed when called upon for us.

fullstop

showpony1 wrote: »

To suggest that Shane Duffy is no longer capable of being a regular premier league starter at a club a few points above bottom like the great Dara O'Shea is nonsense.

Is that why he couldn’t displace the mighty Dan Burn to get back in the Brighton team for most of last season and they shipped him up to the SPL :pac:

If Duffy played and made a mistake you’d be in having a go at ‘Stephen’ for not having the balls to drop him like Celtic did.

Pawwed Rig

I purposely avoided these threads last night so will read back later but one thing I think we gained from last night is a first choice midfield trio. I thought Molumby, Cullen and Browne played very well.

If we had Randolph and/or VAR we were getting something out of that game. Disappointed but if we play similarly against Lux we should do well.
Lux is a massive game for Kenny.

johnnyryan89

tastyt wrote: »

Have to be positive after that

Any changes for Luxembourg? Can’t really see any obvious ones to be honest . Don’t really have the options to change keeper .

Although wouldn’t surprise me to see Hendrick start ahead of Molumby

Definitely have to be positive after that, especially with all the doom and gloom amongst fans for awhile now and the fact Kenny wasn't afraid to drop our experienced players. Especially positive about how our midfield mostly played tonight for the first 60mins, and Robinson put in a good shift tonight.

Think Collins or Long for Connolly is the obvious one. Not sure why Molumby was taken off but would hope Knight is the one to replace him if Kenny makes that change for Luxembourg. Replacement midfielders outside the three that started could be an issue because the lack of effort from most drops. I wouldn't go near the keeper, would destroy the lads confidence to be dropped for the next game even if I think Bazunu should have started last night rather than Travers.

Defence I don't think needs any changes, unless someone has any fitness concerns going into the Luxembourg game. If you were to make a change it probably be Long or Lenihan for Clark. Would be interesting to know if one or two lads could be called up from the U21s for the Qatar game to replace some tired legs in the squad if the lads put the same effort in against Luxembourg.

celt262

fullstop wrote: »

Is that why he couldn’t displace the mighty Dan Burn to get back in the Brighton team for most of last season and they shipped him up to the SPL :pac:

Duffy is finished at PL level.

Mantis Toboggan

Luxembourg beaten by Qatar last night :pac::pac:

Mantis Toboggan

Will be interesting to see where the goals come from on Saturday. Not sure he can start Connolly again he was that bad last night.

fullstop

celt262 wrote: »

Duffy is finished at PL level.

Absolutely he is. Brighton dropped him because he couldn’t play the style they want to play (possession-based, passing football) and the style most elite teams in the world are trying to play. Yet the select few on here want ireland to persist with hoofball that we’ve been playing for 35 years.

Pawwed Rig

Mantis Toboggan wrote: »

Will be interesting to see where the goals come from on Saturday. Not sure he can start Connolly again he was that bad last night.

Jumping on the ground at every opportunity. I am thinking that his previous behaviour is why we didn't get the penalty shout.
Thought Doherty was poor enough aswell given that this is the position we wanted to see him in.
Hendrick was lost when he came on.

Collins or Long for Connolly would seem like the obvious change.

pjohnson

I'd pick O'Hara over Travers next time.

ben.schlomo

A really positive display last night. Only change I'd make is Collins starting, for who I'm not sure, probably Connolly even though I feel he has more goals in him than Robinson.

johnnyryan89

Pawwed Rig wrote: »

I purposely avoided these threads last night so will read back later but one thing I think we gained from last night is a first choice midfield trio. I thought Molumby, Cullen and Browne played very well.

If we had Randolph and/or VAR we were getting something out of that game. Disappointed but if we play similarly against Lux we should do well.
Lux is a massive game for Kenny.

Think last night showed how effective it is to have a midfield that's not carrying any passengers or lads who'd rather avoid looking for the ball.

Luxembourg is massive because we need the win, and we've always found it harder to break down weaker teams than us as they'll do to us what we normally do to better teams. Last night's performance was good, it was badly needed to start off this campaign positively (even though we lost) after the games last year.

Tell you one thing though, Azerbaijan could make this group interesting and don't think Serbia are going to be that confident of three points when they travel to play them next week. Can see them dropping points away to them, they won't be scoring easy goals like last night against their keeper.

McFly85

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

Under Trap or Mick we'd have got the point tonight.

Instead we end up with nothing trying to play a style we can't play.

We need to go back to our strengths.

If we're going to play this game, then I would also say that Trap or Mick will end up getting a disappointing draw to one of the lower seeds with a conservative display when 3 points is required.

I'd be far more positive that Kenny will at least have his team trying to win games.

johnnyryan89

Pawwed Rig wrote: »

Jumping on the ground at every opportunity. I am thinking that his previous behaviour is why we didn't get the penalty shout.
Thought Doherty was poor enough aswell given that this is the position we wanted to see him in.
Hendrick was lost when he came on.

Collins or Long for Connolly would seem like the obvious change.

Given Serbia set up 3-4-3 probably held our wing backs back somewhat because the lads had to remain somewhat defence to deal with Serbia's wide midfielders and wide forwards.

Browne has played that role in a 3-5-2 for Preston, and he's also played wide right for the Irish team. Could possibly be an option if 3-5-2 is going to be the norm now, as it easily can become four at the back mid game if Coleman remains as a CB in the back three but wouldn't be a fan of Doherty playing higher in midfield in a back four.

Nunu

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Honestly, it feels like some posters have Stockholm syndrome from years of being held captive by awful hopeless football.

So true.😂 Pining for it. Like they know no other way.

ebbsy

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

Under Trap or Mick we'd have got the point tonight.

Instead we end up with nothing trying to play a style we can't play.

We need to go back to our strengths.

Under those 2 I would have switched the channel after 20 minutes.

Unwatchable.