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

Duff

Very lax. McGuinness seems an absolute rock, though.

Collie D

Where are you following this, lads? Cant watch but a live score update would do. Doesn't seem to be on LiveScore.

Duff

Collie D wrote: »

Where are you following this, lads? Cant watch but a live score update would do. Doesn't seem to be on LiveScore.

PM'd you there.

Brock Turnpike

That was poor enough in an attacking sense for the vast majority of the half. Seemed incapable of any type of progressive football to bring us up the pitch when in possession.

Then we appeared to suddenly discover how to do it, mainly down the right hand side for the last 5 mins.

McGuinness looks very solid and assured

Noss looks the most composed on the ball, some clever little feints to buy himself time and space.

Connell looks like he's expecting more time on the ball and has been caught a couple of times as a result. Might be a consequence of playing with Queen of the South.

Ferry, Watson, particularly disappointing. In both games now actually.

johnnyryan89

OG but would have been tapped in by Kayode either way. Nice bit of play between Lyons and Noß for the goal. Noß looks a step above the other attacking options we've got in the final third.

johnnyryan89

2-1 on the struck of 90mins. Will be a good win if it stays like this against the Australian Olympic team.

Duff

Good result. Thought McGuinness played very well in defence. Johansson was everywhere when he came on, too. Also thought Wright and Kayode had decent hold up spells.

Brock Turnpike

Very good win. Second half was much better.

Noss, McGuinness the pick of the bunch for me.

Two well worked goals. Some introduction to U21s for Tierney.

Tchaikovsky

Any chance of McGuinness getting game time at Arsenal or will he be in League 1 again next season?

Francie Barrett

It's nice to get the result, but there were problems there. Both McGuinness and McEntee looked really uncomfortable trying to play out from the back, against better quality opposition they would have been punished. Left back looked a bit of a messy for us and the Aussies were constantly getting in behind us. I don't understand why people rave about Connell so much. He's a great left foot, but he has no physical presence and offers nothing in midfield, particularly when we are without the ball. Watson doesn't really look to have done enough for me to merit the minutes he's been getting.

Thought Coventry was much improved this time out, was constantly showing for the ball and trying to receive from defence, put a big shift in to make up for Connell's lack of physicality. Ferry made a few mistakes, but he also showed some decent flashes of ability at times. More to come from him I think. Noss looks to be one our best players with ball at feet. He didn't get much of the ball, but he was effective when he had it. Wright made a huge difference again when he came on yet again. For me he's been Ireland's best player under Crawford's reign. To pick up the ball outside of his own box, run the length of the field gliding past opposition players before putting a pinpoint cross in was special to watch.

johnnyryan89

Tchaikovsky wrote: »

Any chance of McGuinness getting game time at Arsenal or will he be in League 1 again next season?

Back to League One. Possibly even Ipswich again. Arsenal rate him highly but he's probably two more seasons away before even challenging for a spot in their senior squad.

Coventry has been disappointing so far for a lad that's probably got more caps at U21 level than the rest of the starting XI. For me he's probably played his way out of the team. Needs to get out of West Ham and start playing senior football at club level. Even a season at League Two will stand to him as seen by Lee O'Connor who had a good season with Tranmere.

johnnyryan89

https://twitter.com/Cunneen92/status/1400077257453064202

The winning goal.

athlone99

noodler wrote: »

This constant lowering of standards is mad.

We should be beating Luxembourg.

It doesn't have to be pretty but we shouibe getting turned over at home.

Why should we be beating Luxembourg? What do you base that on?

I'm not lowering standards, its where we are now, how can you not see that? We are on a downward spiral, no matter who the manager is. Luxembourg put a plan in place 15-20 years ago and are now reaping the rewards. People need to stop living in the past and realize we are now a tier 3/4 nation. Some people seem to think we have a god given right to qualify for tournaments.

If you look at what Germany, England, Scotland, Wales and even Luxembourg have done, they put a long term plan in place and are now seeing success from it. I think we are probably 10 years away from getting back towards a tier 2 nation. I am also quite positive about the new FAI but until they manage to change the internal politics of the association and put the schoolboy leagues back in a box and put a pyramid structure in place aimed at getting young players into LOI academies we wont move forward.

johnnyryan89

Sam Szmodics will miss both games with a shoulder injury, and Coleman is out of the Andorra game with a hamstring issue but should be alright for Hungary.

athlone99

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Results are going to have to pick up lads. You can't keep putting your hands over your ears and shouting 'RESULTS BLAH BLAH BLAH THEY'RE PASSING THE FOOTBALL'.

Hopefully the scheduled win over Andorra turns this thing around for him, as embarrassing as it is. But it isn't going beyond this campaign unless results improve. That's just the facts of it lads. Like the sky being blue.

Couldnt agree more that result have to pick up. Id take 3 wins and 3 losses for the next 6 games in the WC qualifiers. I think he should really be judged on the Euros campaign and if he lost the first 3/4 games then its time for a change but should be some patience and see if it can come good.

eire4

athlone99 wrote: »

Why should we be beating Luxembourg? What do you base that on?

I'm not lowering standards, its where we are now, how can you not see that? We are on a downward spiral, no matter who the manager is. Luxembourg put a plan in place 15-20 years ago and are now reaping the rewards. People need to stop living in the past and realize we are now a tier 3/4 nation. Some people seem to think we have a god given right to qualify for tournaments.

If you look at what Germany, England, Scotland, Wales and even Luxembourg have done, they put a long term plan in place and are now seeing success from it. I think we are probably 10 years away from getting back towards a tier 2 nation. I am also quite positive about the new FAI but until they manage to change the internal politics of the association and put the schoolboy leagues back in a box and put a pyramid structure in place aimed at getting young players into LOI academies we wont move forward.

Excellent post. I totally agree with you that we are at least a decade or so away from being again a legit tier 2 nation in international football and that will only happen if as you say the FAI get there act together and put a proper development pathway and infrastructure in place and part of that as you rightly say is putting the schoolboy leagues in their place which is as a platform for non elite level players to play. The League of Ireland clubs need to be helped to develop quality academies with quality coaching and that is where the top players should be with a national academy at the top of the pyramid.

Did you smash it

athlone99 wrote: »

Why should we be beating Luxembourg? What do you base that on?

I'm not lowering standards, its where we are now, how can you not see that? We are on a downward spiral, no matter who the manager is. Luxembourg put a plan in place 15-20 years ago and are now reaping the rewards. People need to stop living in the past and realize we are now a tier 3/4 nation. Some people seem to think we have a god given right to qualify for tournaments.

If you look at what Germany, England, Scotland, Wales and even Luxembourg have done, they put a long term plan in place and are now seeing success from it. I think we are probably 10 years away from getting back towards a tier 2 nation. I am also quite positive about the new FAI but until they manage to change the internal politics of the association and put the schoolboy leagues back in a box and put a pyramid structure in place aimed at getting young players into LOI academies we wont move forward.

When did this acceptance of the level we are at happen? When did it become accepted that we are a tier 3 & 4th nation naturally losing at home to countries ranked 94th in the world when we were ranked 32nd at the end of the last group?

Did the retirement of David Mcgoldrick suddenly precipitate a huge dose of pessimism/realism in our belief in the Irish teams capabilities?

It’s a funny one, our past managers got accused bitterly of talking down our players. Now our fans are doing it in turbo mode.

athlone99

Did you smash it wrote: »

When did this acceptance of the level we are at happen? When did it become accepted that we are a tier 3 & 4th nation naturally losing at home to countries ranked 94th in the world when we were ranked 32nd at the end of the last group?

Did the retirement of David Mcgoldrick suddenly precipitate a huge dose of pessimism/realism in our belief in the Irish teams capabilities?

It’s a funny one, our past managers got accused bitterly of talking down our players. Now our fans are doing it in turbo mode.

This is where we are at. We got lucky for 40 years, relying on English clubs to produce players for us. Its not an acceptance but i understand why we are here and i see a way forward back to where we were. But its going to take time. Look at where our players are playing and the amount of game time they are getting. I said it before Chris Shields at Dundalk has more games in Europe than any player in the squad.

Nope we were punching slightly above our weight playing dire football that nobody liked. That has to change, nobody is successful with poor long ball football anymore, Big Sam is finished, Jose past his sell by date, etc.

The difference there is we had trap talking down our players when almost all of the starting 11 were playing in the premier league. FFS Coleman could get a start in the team when he was our best right back. Your point is utter nonsense. When we had a stronger squad, managers repeatedly said they were crap and could only defend. Now we have a poor squad and i for one am being realistic about what they can do. We are 10 years away from being competitive again with Tier1/2 nations.

RonanG86

athlone99 wrote: »

Why should we be beating Luxembourg? What do you base that on?

I've been in the Kenny camp and I'm definitely against going back to tried and trusted hoofball, but we should've beat Luxembourg. And what I'm basing that on is that our guys were playing at higher levels than theirs.

They had one bloke who scored the Champions League, but they also had guys sitting on the bench in the German 2nd division. Their captain is a squad player in the same league that Cullen starts regularly in.

Yes, Luxembourg are on an upward swing and have decent structures in place whereas we're a basket case relying on the English game to develop our players for us, but on the night we still put out guys who, on paper at least, are better footballers who've played at higher levels of the game than them.

Francie Barrett

athlone99 wrote: »

That has to change, nobody is successful with poor long ball football anymore, Big Sam is finished, Jose past his sell by date, etc.

There is literally no one suggesting that we should go back to a pure long ball style.

athlone99

RonanG86 wrote: »

I've been in the Kenny camp and I'm definitely against going back to tried and trusted hoofball, but we should've beat Luxembourg. And what I'm basing that on is that our guys were playing at higher levels than theirs.

They had one bloke who scored the Champions League, but they also had guys sitting on the bench in the German 2nd division. Their captain is a squad player in the same league that Cullen starts regularly in.

Yes, Luxembourg are on an upward swing and have decent structures in place whereas we're a basket case relying on the English game to develop our players for us, but on the night we still put out guys who, on paper at least, are better footballers who've played at higher levels of the game than them.

Yes we probably had the stronger squad but the deciding factor in the game was the one guy with a bit of class playing champions league football and in tight games thats what can get you a win. We dont have that player unfortunately.

athlone99

Francie Barrett wrote: »

There is literally no one suggesting that we should go back to a pure long ball style.

Well to me some posters keep saying SK cant continue with what he is trying to do, we need to go back to our old style. Our old style is kick it long and "put em under pressure" and sit deep and defend when we dont have it.

We need a new way of playing and that will take time to bed in and has and will cause a bit of short term pain for long term gain.

RonanG86

athlone99 wrote: »

Yes we probably had the stronger squad but the deciding factor in the game was the one guy with a bit of class playing champions league football and in tight games thats what can get you a win. We dont have that player unfortunately.

Yeah, but he's at Dinamo Kiev where he scores at a rate of about 1 in 5. He's not Pelé is he? We shouldn't have let him decide the game.

EDIT: Then again some people are complaining that a guy who's played an hour of senior football all season isn't being picked for us, so maybe he is Pele in relative terms.

Did you smash it

Let’s be honest about Kenny’s style. It’s involves passing the ball more, almost entirely in safe positions of the pitch. When we build, it normally breaks down before we get into attacking positions. The seldom chance we create is almost always followed by at least 10 mins (could be far longer) of a lull so we never build momentum and pressure.

This is NOT good to watch. Passing football is not in any way amazing unless it’s carries you to attacking areas.

athlone99

Did you smash it wrote: »

Let’s be honest about Kenny’s style. It’s involves passing the ball more, almost entirely in safe positions of the pitch. When we build, it normally breaks down before we get into attacking positions. The seldom chance we create is almost always followed by at least 10 mins (could be far longer) of a lull so we never build momentum and pressure.

This is NOT good to watch. Passing football is not in any way amazing unless it’s carries you to attacking areas.

The teams best performance was the Slovakia game, i think we created a good few chances that players failed to take. Hard to blame the manager for that. I think we are creating more chances from open play than we did in the previous few years. I think it will improve as they work on the pattern of plays from the back.

Changing a deep rooted style of play takes time. Took pep and kloop 2/3 years at club level working with them everyday. Did you think it was going to be an instant impact? I thought it would be quicker than its been but id rather take the positives so far. I can see something building and i hope it works out for SK.

eire4

athlone99 wrote: »

This is where we are at. We got lucky for 40 years, relying on English clubs to produce players for us. Its not an acceptance but i understand why we are here and i see a way forward back to where we were. But its going to take time. Look at where our players are playing and the amount of game time they are getting. I said it before Chris Shields at Dundalk has more games in Europe than any player in the squad.

Nope we were punching slightly above our weight playing dire football that nobody liked. That has to change, nobody is successful with poor long ball football anymore, Big Sam is finished, Jose past his sell by date, etc.

The difference there is we had trap talking down our players when almost all of the starting 11 were playing in the premier league. FFS Coleman could get a start in the team when he was our best right back. Your point is utter nonsense. When we had a stronger squad, managers repeatedly said they were crap and could only defend. Now we have a poor squad and i for one am being realistic about what they can do. We are 10 years away from being competitive again with Tier1/2 nations.

Again an excellent post. As you rightly say we depended for so long on clubs across the Irish sea to develop our players for us but that started to dry up as big TV money arrived in the mid 90's and accelerated after the start of the 2000's. The FAI's all but total failure to put in place a proper development pathway and infrastructure for our most talented young players then came home to roost and left us gradually with less and less top level talent until we got where we are today all but totally bereft of any top tier talent in our squad.

Your also correct to pick on how we play. As our talent pool lessened we became more and more reliant on just sitting in defending, playing direct and depending on set pieces. That kept us competitive but again less and less so as the talent pool eroded year by year and also because the game has moved on in style and you need now players comfortable in possession under pressure and able to technically deal with the ball and pass accurately under pressure. As you also said our outdated style was dire to watch on top of it all.

Sadly we are at least a decade or so away from being competitive at the top level again and that is assuming the proper development pathways and infrastructure is put in place in the next few years. The good news is if we commit to doing that we can have a team we can be proud of that plays football that is pleasing to watch again but it is going to take time and will only happen if we take the right steps in our own country footballing infrastructure wise.

Mantis Toboggan

athlone99 wrote: »

This is where we are at. We got lucky for 40 years, relying on English clubs to produce players for us. Its not an acceptance but i understand why we are here and i see a way forward back to where we were. But its going to take time. Look at where our players are playing and the amount of game time they are getting. I said it before Chris Shields at Dundalk has more games in Europe than any player in the squad.

Nope we were punching slightly above our weight playing dire football that nobody liked. That has to change, nobody is successful with poor long ball football anymore, Big Sam is finished, Jose past his sell by date, etc.

The difference there is we had trap talking down our players when almost all of the starting 11 were playing in the premier league. FFS Coleman could get a start in the team when he was our best right back. Your point is utter nonsense. When we had a stronger squad, managers repeatedly said they were crap and could only defend. Now we have a poor squad and i for one am being realistic about what they can do. We are 10 years away from being competitive again with Tier1/2 nations.

Lucky for 40 years haha

Mantis Toboggan

Nothing wrong with letting other countries develop our players the Belgians certainly haven't seen any issues with it anyway! The English clubs have the best facilities in the world it would be foolish not to take advantage of that.

~Rebel~

Mantis Toboggan wrote: »

Nothing wrong with letting other countries develop our players the Belgians certainly haven't seen any issues with it anyway! The English clubs have the best facilities in the world it would be foolish not to take advantage of that.

Belgium is a really bad example to be honest - they're exactly the opposite!

Just look through their current squad;
Courtois, Mignolet, Meunier, Castagne, Dendoncker, Witsel, De Bruyne, Tielemans, Praet, Mertens, Lukaku, Benteke, Batshuayi, Trossard.

All of those lads came through Belgian academies, and played their first senior football at Belgian clubs. Then you have Varmaelen, Alderweirald, and Vertonghen who all came through the same Belgian academy together at Beerschot before all being snapped up by Ajax. (Beerschot is also the same academy that produced Dembele and Nainggolan incidentally).

So actually, of the whole squad - a team ranked first in the world - the only lads that didn't come through the Belgian youth system are the two Hazard's, who went to France young.


The Belgian system is exactly what we should be hoping and praying we can build someday - bring through and develop fantastic talent, keep them in the league for the first few years of their senior development, and then let them go for bigger money to the better leagues around Europe.

Tchaikovsky

Mantis Toboggan wrote: »

Lucky for 40 years haha

Unlucky for the 20 years before that

Guffy

Did you smash it wrote: »

We are a long way ahead of them in the world ranking. We were anyway. Falling off a cliff now, when Kenny got the job I knew we wouldn’t qualify to Qatar but I set a modest target of staying in the top 50 in the world for Kenny to get a new contract. A really modest target as when we took over we were 32nd.

Now we might not stay in the top 60.

So if trap was in charge with that team we would have beat them?

Tchaikovsky

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Belgium is a really bad example to be honest - they're exactly the opposite!

Just look through their current squad;
Courtois, Mignolet, Meunier, Castagne, Dendoncker, Witsel, De Bruyne, Tielemans, Praet, Mertens, Lukaku, Benteke, Batshuayi, Trossard.

All of those lads came through Belgian academies, and played their first senior football at Belgian clubs. Then you have Varmaelen, Alderweirald, and Vertonghen who all came through the same Belgian academy together at Beerschot before all being snapped up by Ajax. (Beerschot is also the same academy that produced Dembele and Nainggolan incidentally).

So actually, of the whole squad - a team ranked first in the world - the only lads that didn't come through the Belgian youth system are the two Hazard's, who went to France young.


The Belgian system is exactly what we should be hoping and praying we can build someday - bring through and develop fantastic talent, keep them in the league for the first few years of their senior development, and then let them go for bigger money to the better leagues around Europe.

Interesting to look at where Belgium's senior team was between 2002 and 2014; regularly getting battered and finishing well off the pace for qualification. No reason why the powers that be here shouldn't look at what Belgium did with bringing through quality players.

Did you smash it

Guffy wrote: »

So if trap was in charge with that team we would have beat them?

Trap? What’s he got to do with it?

I was comparing the sudden recent cliff fall in expectations for Kenny’s Ireland compared to Mick’s Ireland.

Did you smash it

Tchaikovsky wrote: »

Interesting to look at where Belgium's senior team was between 2002 and 2014; regularly getting battered and finishing well off the pace for qualification. No reason why the powers that be here shouldn't look at what Belgium did with bringing through quality players.

Let’s cut to the chase, you would need xxx million euro for Ireland to upgrade their nationwide academy club youth system to match belgium.

Irish clubs are under pressure to find 7000 euro to run an under 15s team annual cost.

It’s not going to happen.

Ireland is a small time footballing country. We will fluke upon a good team over the next 20 years just like we did before.

johnnyryan89

Tchaikovsky wrote: »

Interesting to look at where Belgium's senior team was between 2002 and 2014; regularly getting battered and finishing well off the pace for qualification. No reason why the powers that be here shouldn't look at what Belgium did with bringing through quality players.

Clubs and leagues threw massive hissy fits a few years ago when they tried making some changes.

pjohnson

Can we at least all agree that we should scrape a draw tomorrow?

Did you smash it

Did you smash it wrote: »

Trap? What’s he got to do with it?

I was comparing the sudden recent cliff fall in expectations for Kenny’s Ireland compared to Mick’s Ireland.

Mick's ireland was 11 men behind the ball and hope for a duffy header. There's no future in that

DJIMI TRARORE

Norway had to get to the 92nd min to score v Luxembourg, no need to ask who got it,

eire4

Did you smash it wrote: »

Let’s cut to the chase, you would need xxx million euro for Ireland to upgrade their nationwide academy club youth system to match belgium.

Irish clubs are under pressure to find 7000 euro to run an under 15s team annual cost.

It’s not going to happen.

Ireland is a small time footballing country. We will fluke upon a good team over the next 20 years just like we did before.

No question it will take time and money to set up the proper development pathways and infrastructure in Ireland. Not going to happen overnight by any stretch of the imagination. But that is the direction we must go down if we want to develop players who can compete at the top levels of the game on a consistent basis.

There is some money in the game in Ireland and we need to harness that in the correct way and then look to try and bring more in. It will take time and nobody said we were right away suddenly going to be able to match the resources and quality of academy system that say another smaller country like Belgium have. But it can be done.

Not interested in fluking a good team once every 20 years when we can put in place the infrastructure to develop talent on a consistent basis so that we are at least competitive consistently and in good years a real threat as well.

eire4

johnnyryan89 wrote: »

Clubs and leagues threw massive hissy fits a few years ago when they tried making some changes.

So the next time they should be told what their place is in the pyramid and not rolled over for so that the schoolboy leagues can selfishly continue to hold the elite level player back. The schoolboy clubs and leagues have their place in the pyramid below the elite level players and as the place where most players will start out.

Did you smash it

eire4 wrote: »

There is some money in the game in Ireland

Where precisely?

eire4

Lachlan Some Shuffleboard wrote: »

Mick's ireland was 11 men behind the ball and hope for a duffy header. There's no future in that

Nail on the proverbial head (pun intended) there.

eire4

pjohnson wrote: »

Can we at least all agree that we should scrape a draw tomorrow?

Against Andorra tomorrow? We should win. But it will at most IMHO be by 2 goals given how bereft of attacking quality we are.

johnnyryan89

eire4 wrote: »

So the next time they should be told what their place is in the pyramid and not rolled over for so that the schoolboy leagues can selfishly continue to hold the elite level player back. The schoolboy clubs and leagues have their place in the pyramid below the elite level players and as the place where most players will start out.

You will need to find someone with a set of balls first.

eire4

johnnyryan89 wrote: »

You will need to find someone with a set of balls first.

No question about that but it needs to happen.

Did you smash it

sugarman wrote: »

To quote myself from a couple of weeks ago...



No structure and any attempted change is met by complete backlash of the John Delaneys of grassroots world.

I don’t really doubt you but I hadn’t really thought there’s vast sums of public cash ready to make a difference to football in the country.

Certainly there’s no pressure from public opinion I.e. voters that more funds should be made available.

eire4

Did you smash it wrote: »

Where precisely?

Sugarman has detailed the key areas below in his post. I agree with him plus I would add in attracting more private funding such as say Dermot Desmonds investment in Shamrock Rovers. There is also the rewards of money coming back into clubs if they do a good job and a player moves for bigger money later such as the 1.5m that Bohemians recently got for Matt Doherty's move to Tottenham. The majority of the money in both cases was invested in facilities and their respective academies.

Again it will take time to get things right and nobody is saying we can create this all overnight but it is achievable and is the direction we must go for the long term future of the game in this country.

Did you smash it

eire4 wrote: »

Sugarman has detailed the key areas below in his post. I agree with him plus I would add in attracting more private funding such as say Dermot Desmonds investment in Shamrock Rovers. There is also the rewards of money coming back into clubs if they do a good job and a player moves for bigger money later such as the 1.5m that Bohemians recently got for Matt Doherty's move to Tottenham. The majority of the money in both cases was invested in facilities and their respective academies.

Again it will take time to get things right and nobody is saying we can create this all overnight but it is achievable and is the direction we must go for the long term future of the game in this country.

Attracting serious private investment to a league that has eff all prize money and no tv deal is fairly hopeless. The Doherty Bohs money is great but it’s a one off freak windfall.

I don’t mean to overdo pessimism but there’s no real money being generated by the domestic game to be honest about it.

Did you smash it

sugarman wrote: »

It's a bit like the HSE, the vast majority of the public are still under the impression it's underfunded ...but it's quite the contrary, just horribly mismanagement.

My impression is that the Irish public don’t think or care much about it.

athlone99

Did you smash it wrote: »

Attracting serious private investment to a league that has eff all prize money and no tv deal is fairly hopeless. The Doherty Bohs money is great but it’s a one off freak windfall.

I don’t mean to overdo pessimism but there’s no real money being generated by the domestic game to be honest about it.

But there is some and it can be improved. Step 1 get young players into LOI academies with the best playing at 17/18 and LOI teams getting proper transfer fees with that money then feeding back into the clubs and acadamies. They days of home farm or st.kevins gettin 20/30k to send a young lad to the UK needs to stop.

If everyone who travelled to the UK for games went to one less and spent that €150 on LOI football that would also help improve the league and allow reinvestment.

People are starting to see that football needs investment here and the government has recognised that.

We need to get more people like Dermot Desmond and the Comer brothers involved.