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What in the name of bejaysus was that?:mad:. We were total sh!te. We are gonna be completely fcuked against the Swiss if we play like that. Dunne is a muppet.:mad:. Elliot and Keane didn't get supplied with any balls all night, holy fcuk! Not a hope of us qualifying with that performance. A disgrace!:mad: I feel sorry for Cyprus tonight, they deserved all 3 points.
our only hope on wednesday is if the swiss have a few suspended and that man mr given comes to rescue again
At best that performance was dull, at worst it was a bit of a disgrace.
Although it is easy to blame the manager for when a team plays so poorly, almost inexplicably, I am going to take this easy option and lay some blame on Brian Kerr.
I had my worries about where the support from midfield was going to come from before the kick off, when Duff was partnered by two defensive central midfielders and a defender on the other wing. As we have seen, Duff is often out of the game for long periods (as good as he is) and the service to the frontmen can be stifled.
Thankfully, we got an early goal. Full marks to Elliott for putting it away and saving Ireland's blushes, even at that early stage.
Yet again however, Ireland failed to kick on from that and go out looking for more goals. We seemed to almost invite them onto us to attack our goal, with little or no ambition to drive forward ourselves. Our defence got so deep Shay was almost playing as a sweeper. Cyprus, to their credit, saw this and grew in confidence and lay seige to our goal as best they could.
Suddenly a team of has beens, no hopers and never will be's started playing like they were Brazilian. We looked clueless. Didn't know how to tackle them, how to starve them of possession or that queer idea of actually using the ball ourselves, bleh! If Cyprus had a little more genuine quality or a little more luck, we'd have been looking to Euro 2008 tonight.
Shay Given should be given the freedom of wherever he wants to go in Ireland. He's certainly welcome in my house anytime, although I don't live in Ireland. That penalty save was of the highest order, I'll have to see it again to judge if he guessed the right way or just put in a meteoric dive - but thank god for Shay Given. That and a mass of other great saves. If we, by fluke, make it through to the World Cup then we can thank him.
What worried me more than anything in the first half was that Brian Kerr sat through it and did absolutely nothing. How can you be happy when a team ranked somewhere around 100 in the World, whose fans couldn't be arsed to see them, when our lot out-number them 5-1, and not even consider making a single change? It really baffled me. It was clear we needed something to change, Steven Reid or Holland should have been brought on once it was clear the current crop couldn't hack it.
His half time team talk couldn't have been up to much either.
Kerr will have my support until the end of the qualifying campaign, and maybe even until the World Cup if we manage to pull off a miracle and get there. But, its starting to stare us all in the face that he is out of his depth in this job. I cannot remember the last time we played well. We have struggled to beat bad teams before, and failed to win games we should have won against the better teams we come up against. The odd poor performance can be put down as a law of average, but his average is too low.
I'm sure the future of Kerr will be debated to a death and so I'll drop it.
Tonight, I thought the team were lacking direction as much as anything. Desire might be next on the list of things lacking too.
I have serious doubts over the calibre of Kavanagh, and if he starts on Wednesday night then we can move our qualifying campaign into the daisy ward. He was just part of a poor team performance, it must be said. There are others that went missing, Duff being one of them, and we never really saw Finnan either.
Elliott was spot on, and I thought Robbie worked hard when he was in the game, although he could be called guilty for squandering the odd chance. Joking aside though, they had little or no service for long periods - and when there was service it was so high in the air that some brute of a centre back just swept it up.
I am seriously concerned about Wednesday lads. We really missed Andy Reid tonight, so at least we'll have him back, but if Duff is out then I think we are fighting a losing battle.
I really hope we do it and the team of course have my full backing, but its not looking good.
Ade
30' Switzerland 0 - 0 France
http://www.livescore.net/default.dll?page=home
Its currently 0-0 in the other game. If the choclate makers can go on to win 1-0 then we have a real fighting chance of topping this miserable group. Cant see it though.
Dunphy reckons this team is in decline. I think the same sometimes but we do have good players. I think we really miss RMK in his glory days. Its just life after Roy basically. No leadership, everything used to go through him.
I hope Duffer isnt seriously injured. The two Reids on the wings mightnt be able to produce as much as he would.
Oh, the other positive was connolly. He looked very good. Why wasnt him and Elliott tried in previous games when we needed a goal. Its disapointing to see Doc come on.
O Shea in my books is a diaster. He will never be a great player, he is a pretender and is crap at the bread and butter stuff.
On a slightly brighter note Cyprus are not a bad side, at least not as bad
as you expect them to be if you have a look through their recent results
they look fairly creditable.
Especially this one!!
Cyprus (CYP) 3:2 (1:0) Spain (ESP)
UEFA EURO 2000 Prel. Comp. NICOSIA CYPRUS - 05.09.1998
I expected to have to put my modding hat on and referee an online scrap or two but aas it happens you all agree with each other and I agree with you. :mad:
:ball: PP
PS Rodg, me old mate, I know you don't like the Swiss but it's time to leave the "chocolate makers" tag behind - whilst not inordinately offensive it's a racial slur and I push a rigid PC line on here. Thanks. :)
for your sake PP ill drop the "T.C.M" tag but i wouldnt call it racist. My gripe is , the racist swizz abuse on Clinton Morrision. Also, their players in Dublin last time showed nothing but disrespect to us,the fans. Its a bit rich of them to expect a big cead mile failte from mise.
Its still Switzerland 0 - 0 France at Half Time. It looks like its going to be a low scoring game whatever happens.
The Cyprus are a bad team but they arent terrible at home. I think the Switzerland only got a few late goals from Frie late in the game to make it 3-1. The 4-0 days are gone out there IMHO.
Good man Rodg. For all that I agree with your general point. And like I said elsewhere on this board I would (in best Keegan-esque style ranting mode) "love it, just love it" to see Alexander Frei suffer a reciprocal taunting in front of/from the Lansdowne Road crowd. Oh happy days... :D
:ball: PP
A draw is a bad result for us , means we still have to beat the Swiss but
cannnot top the group. The Swiss will probably settle for a draw,
the French definately will.
I should have put some money on a 0-0 draw.
who the f8ck can we play in midfield on wednesday
andy reid is back and hopefuly duff will come through after comming off earlyQuote:
Originally Posted by concanta
yes
france are ahead
hopefuly they will chase the game and get a few cards
we are ok on the wings - itsw central we need someone
As I predicted France are winning 1:0 ;) :o :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by tricky_colour
1-0 to France. Makalale should not be on the pitch. We will not beat this Swiss team.
A france win means second spot is easier for us but means that its the play offs which is always hard. A switzerland win means if we beat them 2-1 then we can top the group but the swiss will come to dublin in good spirits. i dont know which is the best option tbh.
There are no excuses. The second half wasn't any better than the first half - just a different way of playing defensively. To quote a commentator in the second half, "Ireland are frustrating Cyprus"
The Republic of Ireland with its talent is reduced to having to frustrate a diabolical team. Cyprus are diabolical. The Faeroes played well against them. There may not be 0-4s anymore but the manner of the victory should impose that we are better than you and remember that.
Distasteful. Disgraceful. Diabolical. Disastrous. Criminal.
A shocking waste of talent. Usually our strength has been that the sum is better than the individuals. We have very good and very capable individuals. We had this group for the taking.
It would embarrass me to see this team if in the unlikely event we got to the World Cup. We didn't deserve the win..we hardly deserved a draw.
Oh well maybe the next campaign might be different.
But it was destined to end in a draw ;) :DQuote:
Originally Posted by tricky_colour
I think this team like many Irish teams in the past isn't comfortable when they are expected to win, hopefully the direness of this display will make us under-dogs for the game on Wednesday, that is my only hope at this stage. We lacked leadership and our tactics, well we didn't seem to have any , Kerr did make enough changes at half-time to rescue the situation - just about.
Some things are clear - Kilbane cannot be played in the center any longer, he cannot retain possession - one good game away against France when he partnered Roy Keane and came up against rookie opposition is about all he has managed. He is in poor form at the minute anyhow and is simply not a central midfielder.
Cunningham is on his last legs I expect Bruce to buy a replacement at the winter break and Kenny to be a bench warmer, he has been suspect all throughout this campaign. He did some good work today but he needs to be helped through games and struggled for much of this one.
O'Shea, honestly he makes Harte look good?
Carr acts like a 12 year old!
My heart went out to Kavanagh, he tried too hard - I think he wanted to step up today and be the man but was over-anxious.
My finger is pointing to managemnet on this one, sorry Brian - better luck on Wednesday.
Diabolical perforamcne. Theres no denying that. But don't believe for a second that we're going to play like that on Wednesday. Our home record the past 20 years in qualifying matches is as good as anyone.Quote:
Originally Posted by dancinpants
What transpired in that first half, there today, genuinely shocked me. A must win game, Kerr's job (seemingly) on the line, a goal up and we proceed to play like we did. I can't find quite the right word to describe it. Kavanagh (for example), was like a rabbit in front of a set of headlights. Did'nt seem to know what he was doing. Kilbane brought his club form with him so Kerr should'nt have been overly shocked with his inept display.
And there in lied our biggest problem. Been over run in midfield by Cyprus. All it took times, was a long ball in over John O' Shea's head and we were in trouble. The first 'tackle' I saw was by Steven Reid on 77 minutes. From that tackle we had our only period (however brief) of attacking possession since the lead up to the Elliot goal.
A complete lack of application to the cause of playing for Ireland is what I saw. Something I've seen all too often during these type of away games.
Is the lads have any respect for Brian Kerr (I suspect they don't), they'll bust a gut on Wednesday to oust the Swiss.
B.t.w. Cudo's to Shay Given. Our ever present world class performer. Where would we be without him?:eek: Fair dues to Elliot also. As well as the goal. Any time he had the ball. He was a threat. A good option off the bench on Wednesday.