Republic of Ireland V Greece - Friday, 13th October 2023 - Euro 2024 Qualifier

[Trequartista20]

3-1

The one being hugely important as we ended up qualifying on goals scored, being level on points and goal difference with Denmark

A very good goal by Sheridan, not at all in keeping with our performance in the game.

I seem to remember that Jack brought a rather past it and not-very-mobile Ronnie Whelan into midfield alongside McGrath, who was past being able to play in that position to any effect by then.

Kernaghan was dreadful in that match as well.

[tetsujin1979]

That game was thirty years ago this week
https://www.instagram.com/p/CyVtBZdIiR1

[brine3]

I still think the 2002 team was better than the Charlton team. The football was better and arguably they got just as far. Losing on pennos to Spain in the second round vs beating Romania on pennos in the second round, it's a much of a muchness. We also outperformed both Germany (who would go on to be finalists) and Spain in terms of possession. And we did all that without Roy Keane... imagine if the manager has actually managed that particular situation properly.

So the idea that it's not in the Irish DNA to play good football is just not on. Granted, the players were much better back then and it's probable that not a single member of the current squad would have gotten into the 2002 starting 11. Even 18 year old Evan Ferguson would likely be on the bench.

[backstothewall]

That game was thirty years ago this week
https://www.instagram.com/p/CyVtBZdIiR1

Nobody asked for you to do maths Test. Christ I feel old now!
fH0JZ2uLpiQ

[backstothewall]

So the idea that it's not in the Irish DNA to play good football is just not on. Granted, the players were much better back then and it's probable that not a single member of the current squad would have gotten into the 2002 starting 11. Even 18 year old Evan Ferguson would likely be on the bench.

There are none so blind as those who won't see.

Ironically Big Jack would have loved the 2 goals we were beat by last night.

A left back beating a man and putting in a peach of a cross for a centre forward to meet with a towering header. I'm sure someone will remember Stan and Quinner or Cass combining in the same way.

Then the second was pure Charlton. Our full back had pushed up the park, which left us vulnerable in a quick transition. Their centre forward drifted wide to be ready for the long ball in the event we lost possession, which happened when they put Ogbene under pressure and forced a mistake. The ball was then sent into the open space space without hesitation and they were in. Two Greeks midfielders made proper commited runs to get up and support, running past Cullen who only put his head down and started to sprint after they had already run past him.

Masouras was a yard away from it being a tap in but the extra man was able to give it back to him anyway.

We should be scoring that sort of goal. Not conceedibng it.

[brine3]

I thought the Greeks played decent football to be honest.

My memory of Italia 90 is Packie lumping the ball up to Niall Quinn's head.

[weldoninhio]

Azerbaijan
Andorra (a friendly)
I think that's about it

Tonight was as bad as some of those early defeats but against a better team, so we lost by more

Our squad is seem awful and too many players aren't where we thought they'd be three years ago.

But still. That's end of an era stuff tonight. Can't be any question but that we cut our losses next month

Don't forget Andorra were beating us until they ran out of steam

[Trequartista20]

Don't forget Andorra were beating us until they ran out of steam

Well over two years ago now. Our only victory in Kenny's first 16 matches, I think I'm right in saying.

You'd have thought alarm bells would have been already ringing, even then.

Kenny's been afforded extraordinary patience.

[John83]

It is a shame that that era is derided tactically, (maybe by '94 that side could have evolved better) but Charlton was doing POMO long before people came up with a better name for playing long ball and to strengths. Mentioning POMO there is a manager, currently not working, age for a last job and in internationlal football, will be scorned at but Sam Allerdyce it would not be a surprise to see someone of his profile in the job, and ye know what he is pragmatic enough to mix it up and cobble together something inbetween SK silky football philosophy and O'neill ball.
Modern football is high intensity pressing plus short passing to retain possession. Charlton had high intensity pressing plus direct passing. The latter was because of a flawed statistical analysis that ****ed up English football thinking for decades. But yes, he was a smart manager. And yes, it could be less than entertaining at times, but we sure liked qualifying for things and doing well.


Be interesting to go back to threads at the beginning of the campaign… four from Greece is achievable…miss. A point or three against Netherlands…miss. Something against France…miss.

This is the worst it’s ever been, performance wise, under Kenny. A shambles. And getting worse year over year, as Whelan pointed out.

I gave him way too much grace in the first couple of years and it was completely stupid. I hope he does the honourable thing and resigns instead of clinging on until November.

Absolute boll0x.
I thought 9 points was achievable: 6 against Gibraltar, and 3 against Greece. I was one of the least optimistic in that discussion: I didn't expect to look optimistic in hindsight. It's not that we lost to Greece twice, it's that we thoroughly deserved to lose to Greece twice.

[brine3]

Even Jack Charlton evolved with the times, and deserves some credit for that. If you compare the 1994 performances with 1990, things had moved on. Against Italy in 1994 there was much more passing in midfield. Keane, Townsend and Sheridan were stringing things together.

So for all those people harking back to how we played at Euro 88 and Italia 90, I'm not even sure if Jack Charlton would have us playing like that today if he was still alive.

[mypost]

Well over two years ago now. Our only victory in Kenny's first 16 matches, I think I'm right in saying.

You'd have thought alarm bells would have been already ringing, even then.

Jaysus, that 3-0 thumping of Azerbaijan and 4-0 thrashing of Qatar 4 months later should have been unforgettable.

Have to laugh at the English reaction to yet another win for them at the weekend. There, they want him sacked because he isn't adventurous enough with the players he's got. Here, people want the manager gone because he's too adventurous for the ability of the players he's got.

If people want someone sacked, after taking them to quarter finals and semi finals and finals of tournaments over the past few years, what chance has Kenny got?

[EalingGreen]

Have to laugh at the English reaction to yet another win for them at the weekend. There, they want him sacked because he isn't adventurous enough with the players he's got.Unless he's winning the World Cup, Euro's, Grand National and the Boat Race etc, there'll always be a few ********s grumbling about Southgate. And these days they get given a platform way beyond their numbers or value by social media and clickbait etc.

But I'm not sure there's any great groundswell of opinion calling for him to be binned, at least not from serious commentators, and before next year's Finals. Once that is complete, who knows? A bad set of performances could lead the FA (and Southgate himself?) to conclude that he's taken them as far as he could. While his tenure has seen the whole atmosphere around the job improve immeasurably since he took over, meaning it should be much easier to attract top quality applicants than when he was appointed.

But so long as he didn't flop, I'd say they should perservere through to 2026, since he continues to make stady, if slow, progress. Besides which, you never know how a replacement is going to turn out, I mean, both Erikssen and Capello seemed good choices, Hodgson too, yet all three flopped.

On which point, I'd have said originally that Kenny was a sound, imaginative choice for ROI, but he's had long enough now and it seems ever clearer that he's not really up to the job.

[CraftyToePoke]

The mistake you're making there EG is engaging that poster on the assumption he is orbiting in a way which bears an at least tenuous relationship to reality.

[Fixer82]

Even Jack Charlton evolved with the times, and deserves some credit for that. If you compare the 1994 performances with 1990, things had moved on. Against Italy in 1994 there was much more passing in midfield. Keane, Townsend and Sheridan were stringing things together.

So for all those people harking back to how we played at Euro 88 and Italia 90, I'm not even sure if Jack Charlton would have us playing like that today if he was still alive.

The hoofball stuff wasn't always the case. I watched back Ireland V England in 1990 and I thought we passed them off the park. USSR game in 1988 we played them off the park too.

We always had a route one option in Cascarino and Quinn and we got a lot of breaking ball from those hoofed balls when used.

Charlton's stubborness was obvious Vs Egypt when we could have really changed our game and broken them down.

His 4-5-1 formation in 1994 showed some progress. He was willing to use a playmaker like John Sheridan to play a more passing game.

[TonyD]

The hoofball stuff wasn't always the case. I watched back Ireland V England in 1990 and I thought we passed them off the park. USSR game in 1988 we played them off the park too.

We always had a route one option in Cascarino and Quinn and we got a lot of breaking ball from those hoofed balls when used.

Charlton's stubborness was obvious Vs Egypt when we could have really changed our game and broken them down.

His 4-5-1 formation in 1994 showed some progress. He was willing to use a playmaker like John Sheridan to play a more passing game.

I think those slight changes from Charlton were very much against his better judgment and instincts. Fundamentally his view of how the game should be played was, play it into the corners, midfield push up, close down the opposition and work from there. No doubting it worked to a large degree against better opposition and made us a pain to play against for those teams. Where it wasn’t so clever was when we played teams who were prepared to concede a large amount of possession, and we couldn’t break them down. Egypt and Lichtenstein being two of the prime examples. Really, I think post 92 a lot of teams had copped on to us. That and an ageing team meant that Charltons time was well up by 96.

[CSAD]

And Slovakia score. Nice to see our bad luck with results in other groups continued right to the bitter end… the frustrating thing is I forgot that Iceland are on 10 points so mathematically Ireland still have a chance which means Kenny likely won’t walk away tonight :/

[CraftyToePoke]

And Slovakia score. Nice to see our bad luck with results in other groups continued right to the bitter end… the frustrating thing is I forgot that Iceland are on 10 points so mathematically Ireland still have a chance which means Kenny likely won’t walk away tonight :/

Ah here, you're providing the knowledge all night, the lighthouse in this chaos and you forgot about Iceland. Awful form.

[tetsujin1979]

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