Luxembourg v Republic of Ireland - Tuesday, 10th June 2025 - Friendly

[elatedscum]

Lawal called up

[pineapple stu]

Lawal called up
Hm - player who was originally left out so he could have a summer holiday given a late call-up in lieu of no-one.

Bit of a strange one.

[pineapple stu]

May as well start the thread for this I guess. Lawal added to the squad, as Eirambler noted in the Senegal thread. For Luxembourg, the big controversy is around Gerson Rodrigues, who scored the winner in Dublin four years ago, who is in the squad despite his domestic abuse conviction appeal being heard (https://today.rtl.lu/news/luxembourg/a/2298936.html) (and largely upheld, except to increase the compensation) last week. Him being their record scorer may have something to do with it. When Daniel da Mota (99 caps) was convicted of defrauding a pensioner of a six-figure sum in 2020, he was dropped for a couple of years.

Anyways, have to be vaguely confident of this one, even given recent history with Luxembourg. They lost 1-0 at home to Slovenia on Friday and beat Sweden 1-0 in March, both in friendlies. But in the Nations League, they didn't win a single game against the North, Bulgaria and Belarus.

Presume we can expect some changes. Slightly surprisingly, my prediction for Senegal had 10 of 11 spots correct (but I had O'Brien instead of McAteer, strangely), so to give that another go -

--------------------O'Leary--------------------
O'Brien----Collins----Omobamidele----Scales
Festy------Taylor------Smallbone------Manning
--------------------McAteer--------------------
--------------------Parrott---------------------

[tetsujin1979]

Luxembourg fans are planning a protest at the game
https://www.reddit.com/r/LeagueOfIreland/s/Ogyz3mbqzF

[Razors left peg]

Hm - player who was originally left out so he could have a summer holiday given a late call-up in lieu of no-one.

Bit of a strange one.

Someone said on the Senegal thread that Taylor picked up a knock which led to him coming off, could Lawal be a replacement for him?

[Razors left peg]

https://x.com/IrelandFootball/status/1932490443813761309

5 Changes from Senegal game for today

[elatedscum]

Someone said on the Senegal thread that Taylor picked up a knock which led to him coming off, could Lawal be a replacement for him?

Both Taylor and Honahan were doubts but were able to train fine yesterday

[Crosby87]

Rodrigues Dardari
Moriera Barriero Sinani
Dzogovic Jans Korac Carlson Bohnert
Pereira

Fine lineup for the Flying Luxies

[Crosby87]

Just reading about Florian Bohnert in preparation for this classic.

His life story reminds me a lot of a poster on here from many moons ago, Nigel.

[pineapple stu]

Someone said on the Senegal thread that Taylor picked up a knock which led to him coming off, could Lawal be a replacement for him?
Taylor (and everyone else from Friday) on the bench, so he's just an addition. Weird one - especially if (as is likely) he doesn't get any game time

Anyways, let's see how things go. Phillips and O'Leary in for debuts but overall nothing mad in that XI

[Crosby87]

Why are they called Luxembourgish?

Is that no one can be a true 100% Luxer?

[Razors left peg]

Taylor (and everyone else from Friday) on the bench, so he's just an addition. Weird one - especially if (as is likely) he doesn't get any game time

Anyways, let's see how things go. Phillips and O'Leary in for debuts but overall nothing mad in that XI

I actually quite like the line up. Not really a fan of Phillips and dont think he'll be a long term starter for us but overall it looks to have a decent balance.

[pineapple stu]

Yeah, that there's nothing mad isn't a bad thing. O'Leary deserves a cap. O'Brien, Ferguson and Parrott in should actually strengthen us. Then Phillips is the one player that we're really looking at as an unknown and that's ok. I wouldn't have liked to have gone mad with Honohan, Finn, Phillips and Lawal all starting. I don't think that's useful

[CraftyToePoke]

Hm - player who was originally left out so he could have a summer holiday given a late call-up in lieu of no-one.

Bit of a strange one.

If we see Lawal but not Finn we have an answer to that one and how Finn looked overall in training maybe ?
HH wasn't exactly glowing about the call him during the call up. Wanted to see his level against our own lads, and the previous squad presser he said he'd watched him and he was good sometimes but other times not, in France. Particularly with Phillips starting, which I think he's lucky to be. Anyway, just a theory.

[Razors left peg]

If we see Lawal but not Finn we have an answer to that one and how Finn looked overall in training maybe ?
HH wasn't exactly glowing about the call him during the call up. Wanted to see his level against our own lads, and the previous squad presser he said he'd watched him and he was good sometimes but other times not, in France. Particularly with Phillips starting, which I think he's lucky to be. Anyway, just a theory.
Thats kinda the theory I always had about Jack Byrne, when he was in training against better players he wasn't good. I agree, if Finn doesn't get much of a look in tonight I wouldn't expect to see him again for a while

[SkStu]

This is a tough watch so far. We need to get our foot on the ball, try and hold possession for a few minutes.

Outrageous that Rodrigues is being selected to play by the way. I’d like to think we’d have a bit more morals about us if in the same boat. When you see the kerfuffle about Robbie Keane managing in Israel and how it rules him out of the Irish gig in the future, it kinda pales in comparison to a convicted domestic abuser!

[Crosby87]

You think that's bad? Researching for the post game podcast I found Sinani's favorite band is Jedward!

[Razors left peg]

Awful stuff so far. Mainly caused by lack of any decent ball control through midfield.

[SkStu]

You think that's bad? Researching for the post game podcast I found Sinani's favorite band is Jedward!

That’s a hair-raising admission.

[SkStu]

Awful stuff so far. Mainly caused by lack of any decent ball control through midfield.

Ref is a bit of a twit too.

[zero]

reminds me of the kenny era so far.

[Razors left peg]

Ref is a bit of a twit too.
Hard to blame the ref for us not being able to complete a forward pass

[joey B]

absolute muck this…..

[pineapple stu]

absolute muck this…..
Yup.

It's a June friendly and it'd be harsh to talk of it as a step back for HH, but I don't think there's a single positive to take from that half. Maybe except for O'Leary looking solid

[rebelmusic]

Interesting how frail we look playing against a team that's pressing. All the fluid movement on Friday is nowhere to be seen

[CraftyToePoke]

Real end of season, scruffy nothing half. Kind of game it only becomes something if you lose it, so any kind of 0.1 win please & forget about it then.

[Crosby87]

Players don't want to be there anymore than anyone else would

[Crosby87]

The Luxers have won 1 gold medal at the Summer Olympics since they started participating in 1912.

Can anyone guess what event

[CraftyToePoke]

The Luxers have won 1 gold medal at the Summer Olympics since they started participating in 1912.

Can anyone guess what event

Cycling ?

[SkStu]

Hard to blame the ref for us not being able to complete a forward pass

I didn’t.

[Crosby87]

Cycling ?

No Sir

[joey B]

McAteer really should have done better there,bad miss….

[SkStu]

Phillips a million miles off it.

[SkStu]

Ball watching by Ferguson and he takes a yellow as a result of it.

[zero]

forgot he (ferguson) was playing to be honest.

[yurt]

Knight has been very poor this evening.

That disallowed goal was quality aside from the timing of the run/pass obviously.

[rebelmusic]

Yeah please bring on Idah. Ferguson has been a ghost for most of this game.

[CraftyToePoke]

No Sir

1500 meters

[Crosby87]

No studio or analysts for RTE? Has this happened before?

thought this match would have moved the needle

[pineapple stu]

Our first shot on target there with 20 to go...

[SkStu]

1500 meters

Javelin?

[Crosby87]

1500 meters

Only two guesses. Amazing.

[zero]

you'd be generous to give ferguson more than 2/10.

[SkStu]

Only two guesses. Amazing.

Everyone remembers the infamous Josy Barthel.

[SkStu]

you'd be generous to give ferguson more than 2/10.

It’s a head scratcher though what’s going on with him. It really is.

[Eirambler]

I actually think that was to be expected from Ferguson based on the season he has had. I'd have left him out completely for these games.

If he comes back after the summer, gets a full pre-season and still looks that lethargic, then it really is a problem.

[Eirambler]

Badly missing the creativity of Azaz tonight. Feels like he's a key player for us now, maybe the first name on the teamsheet (and not just alphabetically).

[pineapple stu]

If we see Lawal but not Finn we have an answer to that one and how Finn looked overall in training maybe ?
So we get 45 seconds plus injury time of Finn and Lawal interrupted his holidays for nothing.

This is one of the worst games I can remember since Malta away I think (and at least we won that). A dreadfully insipid performance from us and if anyone deserves the win it's Luxembourg. A wake-up call for Hungary next.

Meanwhile Senegal's first team winning in Wembley

[Eirambler]

Well, that will go down in the record books as a match that took place.

[2 Year Contract]

That firmly goes into the category of 90 minutes I’ll never get back.



Meanwhile Senegal's first team winning in Wembley
Was played in the City Ground in Nottingham. A good result for them none the less