Georgia V Republic of Ireland - Tbilisi - 12th October 2019 - Euro 2020 Qualifier

[Tipp Townie]

I know what you mean, but Euro 2012 change my view a bit? Obviously the draw did us no favours that year, but despite my best efforts to enjoy our involvement, I really didn't.

Maybe its a age thing? I was only slightly older than yourself in 1990 and I also didn't care at all about our style of football. I care more about style as I get older.

But most of all I want us to be competitive, and to learn lessons of the past. We rarely beat top sides in competitive matches. So we HAVE to max out the results against the 'weaker' teams. Saturday was unbelievably dire though. It's not just the negativity; we could barely pass or control the ball. Whatever it was it wasn't football. My 8 year old son got fed up with how many times I said "this is so poor" or words to that effect. Seems like I had it on repeat and didn't even realise.

[backstothewall]

I know what you mean, but Euro 2012 change my view a bit? Obviously the draw did us no favours that year, but despite my best efforts to enjoy our involvement, I really didn't.

Maybe its a age thing? I was only slightly older than yourself in 1990 and I also didn't care at all about our style of football. I care more about style as I get older.

But most of all I want us to be competitive, and to learn lessons of the past. We rarely beat top sides in competitive matches. So we HAVE to max out the results against the 'weaker' teams. Saturday was unbelievably dire though. It's not just the negativity; we could barely pass or control the ball. Whatever it was it wasn't football. My 8 year old son got fed up with how many times I said "this is so poor" or words to that effect. Seems like I had it on repeat and didn't even realise.

We all want us to be competitive. We're just good enough that we can hope to qualify for these things the odd time and don't have to get our satisfaction from taking the odd scalp (like Georgia).

Our style is dreadful at times but we have to cut our cloth according to the players we have. For whatever reason we don't have a Liam Brady or even a Wes Hoolohan these days. We can't wish one into existence and until another player of that calibre emerges we have to be pragmatic.

We've been dealt a lucky break in that there are 2 players in this group who are capable of that sort of magic and it seems both are going to be unavailable to our opponents.

And yes Euro 2012 was traumatizing. But 2 of the teams in our group met in the final and the other were at the start of a golden era which would take them to the World Cup final. There was nothing anyone could have done to improve upon what we got out of that tournament. We were shafted by the draw. Simple as that.

[Fixer82]

We can’t put all the blame on McCarthy for Saturday. It’s not his fault players gave the ball away or couldn’t string more than two passes together or kicked the ball out of play when it was easier to make a pass to a team-mate.

McCarthy should’ve put Connolly on sooner and Byrne on in my opinion but the majority of the blame for me lies at the players’ feet

[Stuttgart88]

Yep, quite literally at their feet.

It does astonish me how players that are generally very competent at club level just go to pot playing for us.

[jbyrne]

Yep, quite literally at their feet.

It does astonish me how players that are generally very competent at club level just go to pot playing for us.

i think we play at a slower pace than many of them are used to and i thought it was noticeable on sat how often we were pushed off the ball. I can remember very few 50/50s that we came out on top.

[Stuttgart88]

I thought the players lacked awareness. I lost count of the number of times they were dispossessed easily. Our midfielders almost surprised they were tackled so quickly and weren’t given time to do something fancy. Hourihane was biggest culprit, but all of them were guilty.

[Tipp Townie]

We all want us to be competitive. We're just good enough that we can hope to qualify for these things the odd time and don't have to get our satisfaction from taking the odd scalp (like Georgia).

Our style is dreadful at times but we have to cut our cloth according to the players we have. For whatever reason we don't have a Liam Brady or even a Wes Hoolohan these days. We can't wish one into existence and until another player of that calibre emerges we have to be pragmatic.

We've been dealt a lucky break in that there are 2 players in this group who are capable of that sort of magic and it seems both are going to be unavailable to our opponents.

And yes Euro 2012 was traumatizing. But 2 of the teams in our group met in the final and the other were at the start of a golden era which would take them to the World Cup final. There was nothing anyone could have done to improve upon what we got out of that tournament. We were shafted by the draw. Simple as that.

Yeah, competitive was probably the wrong word. I meant within the 90 minutes. I want to at least see some energy and fight within the matches, but there have been several times recently when even that seems to be missing. It happens sometimes, it certainly happened under Jack too, but it's happening too much in recent years.

Style wise I agree, to a large extent. Yep we need to be pragmatic. But I do think there is a bit more we can do with the players we have.

Re. Euro 2012 - my point is, looking back on the harshness of the draw, or even being realistic back in 2012 leading into the tournament itself, didn't/doesn't make it any more enjoyable. I always thought i'd be able to put that to one side and enjoy a tournament anyway. But by and large I didn't. If we have to lose all three games, I can deal with it if we've given it a go and provided some entertainment and showed ourselves in a good light. But we just looked massively out of our depth, contributed almost nothing on the pitch, and were effectively eliminated as soon as Spain scored in the first minute of the second game.
So, returning to the original comment (apols, can't remember who by) about 'stinking out' Euro 2020, yeah I worry about that.
Although I suppose since Euro 2012 I'm more prepared for it... so IF we do qualify this time I'll be adjusting my expectations accordingly. Ie. getting even more drunk than usual.

[backstothewall]

Yeah, competitive was probably the wrong word. I meant within the 90 minutes. I want to at least see some energy and fight within the matches, but there have been several times recently when even that seems to be missing. It happens sometimes, it certainly happened under Jack too, but it's happening too much in recent years.

Style wise I agree, to a large extent. Yep we need to be pragmatic. But I do think there is a bit more we can do with the players we have.

Re. Euro 2012 - my point is, looking back on the harshness of the draw, or even being realistic back in 2012 leading into the tournament itself, didn't/doesn't make it any more enjoyable. I always thought i'd be able to put that to one side and enjoy a tournament anyway. But by and large I didn't. If we have to lose all three games, I can deal with it if we've given it a go and provided some entertainment and showed ourselves in a good light. But we just looked massively out of our depth, contributed almost nothing on the pitch, and were effectively eliminated as soon as Spain scored in the first minute of the second game.
So, returning to the original comment (apols, can't remember who by) about 'stinking out' Euro 2020, yeah I worry about that.
Although I suppose since Euro 2012 I'm more prepared for it... so IF we do qualify this time I'll be adjusting my expectations accordingly. Ie. getting even more drunk than usual.

I can go along with most of that. Life has given us lemons so we have to make lemonade. But we maybe aren't squeezing quite as much juice as we could.

[Fixer82]

I can go along with most of that. Life has given us lemons so we have to make lemonade. But we maybe aren't squeezing quite as much juice as we could.

Need to throw some caster sugar in

[Stuttgart88]

After all is said and done, failure to win in Georgia hasn't cost us anything really. We'd still need a win in November. Maybe it'd have allowed us to play for a draw in Geneva but I'm not sure that'd have changed anything.

[Fixer82]

After all is said and done, failure to win in Georgia hasn't cost us anything really. We'd still need a win in November. Maybe it'd have allowed us to play for a draw in Geneva but I'm not sure that'd have changed anything.

I’d rather be playing for the win against Denmark than playing for the draw

[paul_oshea]

A win against Georgia and two draws which should have been more than within reach would have seen us through. Mick had to go for it against Georgia, and he failed miserably. That was the time to play the 3-5-2 and play it with the correct players.

[Fixer82]

A win against Georgia and two draws which should have been more than within reach would have seen us through. Mick had to go for it against Georgia, and he failed miserably. That was the time to play the 3-5-2 and play it with the correct players.

Agreed

[Stuttgart88]

We were rank in Georgia and the selection has to be questioned, definitely. But I still think it’s a bit revisionist to think that had we played for a draw in Geneva we’d have got it. The Swiss are comfortably a better side than us. We can only get 85th minute equalisers so often.

Had we got the draw in Geneva we could have had a "convenient" draw with Denmark that'd put us both through on 16pts versus Swiss 15.

[osarusan]

Maybe it'd have allowed us to play for a draw in Geneva but I'm not sure that'd have changed anything.

A casual observer would have had no way to tell that we weren't playing for a draw anyway, the way we were set up. Very hard to describe the Geneva performance as playing for a win, even with a 3-5-2 (or 5-3-2).

And even though we need to beat Denmark, we'll look like we're playing for a draw for the first 60-70 minutes i guess.

[tetsujin1979]

Thread bumped, archived, and locked
Haz4rW_q_ZQ