Kazakhstan V Republic of Ireland - Friday, 7th September 2012 - World Cup 2014 Q

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Originally Posted by Colbert Report

Is McCarthy that much better though?

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Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: Yes, his movement and first touch are far superior to either of the two, he does the simple things right and doesn't desperately head it or boot it away whenever the ball comes to him in the air; he takes it down and plays. He has better awareness and you could see him watching the game open up before him on two or three occasions, most notably his shot early on. He's also confident, which Whelan isn't at all and Andrews isn't on the ball.

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Originally Posted by Spudulika

Funny seeing people accuse Brady of being blinded by his loyalty/friendship to Trap and being biased. As opposed to Richie the whinge/wannabe being in the pay of the anti-O'Brien INM. Pretty funny, if only it wasn't so idiotic.

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Or they both are viewing it from a football point of view.
Brady thinks our players aren't good enough and no other manager would do better.
Sadlier thinks we have no chance of qualifying and someone else would at least try something different.

The amount of revisionism tonight from the RTE pundits is incredible. These are the same people who'd been calling for Doyle to be dropped for months and are now assuming the position of "everyone thought he should start" and using it as a stick to beat Trap with.
Meanwhile the poor performances of Walters and McCarthy who they'd been salivating over for months and persistently called for their inclusion goes unmentioned.

Whatever about Trap out how about Tony O'Donoghue and Bill O'Herlihy out?

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

Why wasn't McCarthy screaming for the ball then? He looked tidy but he hardly imposed himself on the game, and that's not solely because O'Dea was hoofing it all game.

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They were all hoofing it, not just O'Dea.
I never ever heard Liam Brady having to scream for the ball to be passed to him because it was the plan to pass it to him. I wouldn't take every thing Trap says about a player literately. Does a midfielder have to not only show for the ball but then scream his head off to get the attention of the defender in possession, who has his eyes fixed solid on the horizon.

The worst hoofer was Josh. Every single time he got the ball, with plenty of space and time he hoofed and for the most part directly at a Kaz player. McCarthy was solid and for once our midfield didnt look like a complete wasteland (not that it was that good). Whelan was horrific, Ward horrific, Cox horrific, Keane horrific....sigh.

On the performance tonight I thought we missed Duff massively for his work in possession, ball retention and general build up play that isn't hoofball. He brought that tempo and platform for almost everything good we do in the last decade and today was what I feared for life after Duff, just a series of moves breaking down from the first pass in the final third.
McGeady seemed to be desperately drifting all over the place trying in vain to fill the void of Duff's presence, having only one of them makes it too simple to double up on them and mark them out of proceedings.

Otherwise same old problems, why we hoofball against a team dominating us in the air I don't know. Our fullbacks remain dreadful at building up play and our centre midfield was anonymous as per usual. Whelan has been shocking in the past number of games and needs to be dropped. O'Shea and Ward need to learn how to distribute and not just launch aimless long balls all the time.
Trap's concession to change is a weak and confusing one with Cox's role that has made us weaker overall, if this system is to function we need Duff back ASAP.

I'm the internet typing equivalent of speechless, more or less.

Except just looking at the last post, I can't see any fault on O'Dea's part. It wasn't his fault we were the footballing equivalent of an incohesive, primitive, neanderthal version of a football team.

All my worst fears (articulated early afternoon above) materialised tonight except for the result.

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Originally Posted by rebelmusic

The worst hoofer was Josh. Every single time he got the ball, with plenty of space and time he hoofed and for the most part directly at a Kaz player. McCarthy was solid and for once our midfield didnt look like a complete wasteland (not that it was that good). Whelan was horrific, Ward horrific, Cox horrific, Keane horrific....sigh.

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I'd agree with those assessments except for Keane, he's a finisher getting no service. You can't expect him to be anything but anonymous if the service isn't there. The problems are the others you mentioned and the general philosophy of looking for Westwood to hoof it all the time.

It's fine to say things should have been different in the selection up front. But, in the first half anyway, the issue lay in the fact that O'Dea and St. Ledger seemed intent on hoofing long balls forward to Cox on the right, Keane and Walters. It was completely futile and totally bypassed the midfield. I saw Whelan come deep for a ball about 50 minutes in but he was ignored by St. Ledger who decided to peg it up top with no success. Stephen Ward was also quite guilty of it. Why O'Shea wasn't at centre-half? He's a Premier League centre-half. The same cannot be said of either St. Ledger or O'Dea.

I must wonder what McGeady must have been thinking looking back at Ward behind him. Defensively, Ward was given little problems. On the ball, he looked completely limited. There was one stage where he took slightly too long on the ball and then you could see McGeady had to make a quick run down the line inside the right-back to give Ward some form of option. Ward proceeded to try to dink the ball to McGeady but it ended straight in the chest of the right-back. It was amateur stuff. There was another instance where Ward had the ball on the line and was closed in. Most quality players, in this instance, would angle to kick the ball off the defender and earn a throw. Ward stood there with the ball at his feet, frozen. The result was a Kazakh throw after Ward was forced into action.

I did like McCarthy's contribution. In terms of possession, I'd say he saw more of it than Whelan and barely lost it, unless he was trying something more ambitious, but he rarely got into positions to try something ambitious. Ireland would have easily bossed that centre circle to provide a platform for the attack because opposition seemed non-existent. Maybe it was due to them not demanding the ball half as aggressively as they could have, but they were available at most points.

Up front, I will admit that Keane didn't do enough. But the supply wasn't there either. Eventually, he managed to be in the right place at the right time, as he often does, and gain the penalty. In true top goalscorer fashion, he stuck it. Nice penalty, good power on it.

Doyle and Long impressed. I thought Walters would be a better option than Doyle due to club form. Doyle put that to bed emphatically. One question I would ask, if Trap is refusing to play a winger on the wing (McClean) and plays a striker instead, then shouldn't a case be made for Long and Doyle; both of whom have filled this role for country (Long) and club (Doyle at Reading and Wolves)? So, maybe against Germany Trap could switch Long and Doyle for Walters and Cox, using this evening's performance as a basis?

Also, do people still believe that Trap picks players on the basis of how they have performed under him for Ireland in the past because he feels it is the best selection policy? Or is it because he doesn't bother to watch the Premier League to see Shane Long is playing better and at a higher level than, arguably, all the other strikers?

Fair play to Richie Sadlier, whatever you think of what he's saying, he has no problem with harrying Liam Brady when he feels Brady needs to justify some point he has made. Respect and all Brady deserves, if he's going to hold back his criticism on Trap then he needs to state why. I only wish Sadlier had pulled Brady up when Brady stated that there are 5 players whom the Irish public would rather see start there today and would support the team more so if they had; Long, Doyle, McClean, Coleman and Wilson are the 5 names that spring to mind, Gibson aside due to recent behaviour.

Trap's english is hardly as bad as it was in that interview. Tony O'Donoghue asked him had he taken this team as far as he could. Trap had the question interpreted, whether he understood the crux of the question he decided to ignore it and answered that this team can be better, similar to as it was against Serbia. A cop out. There was also an early moment in which O'Donoghue referred to change and alteration in tactics and personnel. Trap seemed to half-comprehend the question also and said something like he won't change, and he changed in the second half to bring on Doyle.

Just get rid.

Same old clueless sh*te. Everybody in the pub was of the same opinion. Real anger, snapshot I know but I bet it wasn't the only pub sounding off.

How the hell did we get a win?! The underperformers from this starting 11 have to be DROPPED.

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Originally Posted by Murfinator

I'd agree with those assessments except for Keane, he's a finisher getting no service. You can't expect him to be anything but anonymous if the service isn't there. The problems are the others you mentioned and the general philosophy of looking for Westwood to hoof it all the time.

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4-4-2 is completely redundant against teams that keep the ball fairly well, that seems to be most teams even the minnows these days, we get dragged out of position constantly and when we do get it we give it away and the cycle begins again. England who have far superior players to us looked average at best playing 4-4-2. We need a 3 man midfield to help stop us being over run and maybe even keep the ball a bit more. Of the back four I'd have only had one of the starting four and that would be jos at centre back. We have far better options around at full back like Wilson, Clark, Kelly.

I suppose with Keane i'm always looking for leadership as well and i never see it. If we're not supposed to be playing hoofball which is the theory (That Trap doesn't push it in training) he should be going back and shouting at people. He also said the in pre match interview that he would be helping out in midfield, i never saw this. Someone suggested the formation would be good if it was a 4-2-3-1 setup which i would guess in a way is what Trap was intending to with Cox on the field. They reverted into the usual 4-4-2 with a slow-paced striker on the wing who did nothing in midfield and sent in some of the worst crosses i've seen in the modern game.

It's gone beyond all sense of reality that a decorated manager can't seem to make good tactical decisions. We won because of the energy Doyle and Long are capable of bringing. If Long had been on from the start instead of Keane, or we played 5 midfielders in midfield, i think we would have had it in the bag much earlier on.

Wilson needs to get a chance at left back. I'm not sure who can actually replace Josh though. People will start shouting for Foley but these are the same people who were shouting for Ward and i wouldn't expect him to be much better. Maybe O'Brien is our salvation, i really don't know.

What i do know is that we need our real leader back asap, the Dunney Monster.

One massive plus I'll take from tonight is a seemingly rejuvenated Doyle. The confidence he showed to take the ball from the centre circle, out to the left and all the way to the touchline before putting a better ball in there than McGeady had managed all game was a joy to see. His finish for the goal was delightful also, struck it with just enough vigour and plenty accuracy. His post-match interview compounded the well-wishes I have for him as a player. He mentioned his desire to get back to the highest level in the interview- in January, I would hope.

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Originally Posted by Olé Olé

One massive plus I'll take from tonight is a seemingly rejuvenated Doyle. The confidence he showed to take the ball from the centre circle, out to the left and all the way to the touchline before putting a better ball in there than McGeady had managed all game was a joy to see. His finish for the goal was delightful also, struck it with just enough vigour and plenty accuracy. His post-match interview compounded the well-wishes I have for him as a player. He mentioned his desire to get back to the highest level in the interview- in January, I would hope.

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I was listening to Damien Richardson and Pat Fenlon after the game and both said Doyle went out and played his own game rather than follow whatever gibberish was offered from the sideline.

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Originally Posted by Colbert Report

Who put that bet down at 50-1????????

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Me!!! we scored in pretty much the next minute, I will look at the time on the slip.



Single - Republic of Ireland

1 line at £0.50 per line
Total stake for this bet: £0.50
Potential Return: £25.50
Time: 07/09/12 18:47
Receipt No: O/141647901/0000075

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

The Kazakh players don't seem to be picking up as many injuries now.

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Can't blame em though can you , they must be absolutely gutted, they must have thought they had that
one in the bag and to not get anything out of the game is a major downer.

http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/8...79largegp6.jpg

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Originally Posted by rebelmusic

The worst hoofer was Josh. Every single time he got the ball, with plenty of space and time he hoofed and for the most part directly at a Kaz player. McCarthy was solid and for once our midfield didnt look like a complete wasteland (not that it was that good). Whelan was horrific, Ward horrific, Cox horrific, Keane horrific....sigh.

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I thought they all hoofed it and when our CMs actually had decent posession they hoofed it too. In my simple football manual there are two types of pass: a measured pass (over any distance) and a speculative pass. I can't single out any player for being the worst offender tonight because no matter who had the ball - full backs, centre-backs or centre-mid -, all I saw was speculative passes. Unbelievable stuff in this day and age.

Just out of curiousity...when we played Georgia in the last WC campaign and came back from 0-1....was our performance much better then? (Granted i remember Duff was fantastic but besides him)

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Originally Posted by Noelys Guitar

I was listening to Damien Richardson and Pat Fenlon after the game and both said Doyle went out and played his own game rather than follow whatever gibberish was offered from the sideline.

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The whole point is that players should always play their own game. That requires picking the right players. Cox does not play his own game out wide. Square pegs, round holes. I don't know when I first posted that analogy here, probably around 2003. Ward played his own game too, that of a very limited full back. O'Shea didn't look like a full back either.

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Originally Posted by rebelmusic

Just out of curiousity...when we played Georgia in the last WC campaign and came back from 0-1....was our performance much better then? (Granted i remember Duff was fantastic but besides him)

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Was that not under Kerr when Doherty grabbed the winner?

Either way, it's irrelevant and Trap has to go.