We bottled it. :(
We bottled it. :(
I'm disgusted. Is this not an opportunity to say fupp it and start throwing on McClean and Gibbo.
Even the ESPN commentator is asking for McClean FFS.
Trap out!!
In fairness, if you turn it on it's head, seeing how limited we are against top class opposition shows how huge and achievement it was to qualify.
And yes, I started drinking after about 15 minutes and it's been pretty intensive since then
We got a corner!!!!
Small victories
Time to get Green on.
Can't pass, can't tackle, can't cross. Trap out, and several players need to go with him.
Aiden McGeady that round thing needs to be won when it's next to you on the floor.
For poops and giggles, why not just throw McClean on just to give him a go? whats the worst that can happen now?!
He was listening!
Poops?
well Adam has a swear filter on so I assumed I couldn't use the s word.
Gibson must be annoyed that Cox and Green are ahead of him for a midfield place...
Bleak :(
Spain to get another couple? :(
Surely that was a handball?!
That was lucky, for a minute there I thought we were gonna get hammered :p
Whimper.
jaysus our fans were unreal. proud to be irish
pity we cant play football;)
Very proud of our supporters. Trap did well to qualify with this team but they did not know (or were unable) to compete against this quality of opposition.Quote:
Originally Posted by the bear
Terrible, 7 goals conceeded in 180 mins. All this with a manager who prides himself on tight defensive play, all 7 have been sloppy errors. We look inept in defence, flakey in midfield and blunt upfront. The worst bit was there was simply no fight from any of the players, it was almost lik e a Staunton performance in that sense. I admire Trap for getting us there but it seems he can't inspire the players or he's lost the dressing room or something
Gutted because of the performance and the result, but proud of the fans. Spain were just on another level.
How are people blaming Trap for this?
Dunne has been a mess, the less said about Given the better, St.Ledger is sadly all we have and can't even get a game in the Championship, O'Shea can barely run, Duff tries hard but has lost pace, Keane should be taken out back and shot and we're left with the maestros of Paul Green, Stephen Ward and the rest to make up a squad.
It's a miracle we got here and people are wanting the manager sacked because we can't stand up to the best team in the world?
true, we completely lost our basic structure and strength. in fairness spain can be unplayable but we were muck against croatia as wellQuote:
Originally Posted by cfdh_edmundo
My ratings.
Given - 5 - A few very sloppy mistakes and some poor distribution. Completely not like him. Am gutted for him.
O'Shea - 6 - Probably our best defender, even still he made a few mistakes early on.
Dunne - 5 - Looked very sluggish, although he did improve a bit as the game progressed.
St Ledger - 4 - Probably the worst game he has had for us. How he ended up on the deck for two of the goals was ridiculous.
Ward - 4 - I have always said he is just out of his depth at left back. He showed it again tonight, positionally shocking.
Duff - 6 - Very quiet. Did a lot of tracking back and worded hard, but I don't recall him getting forward once.
Andrews - 7 - Easily our best player. Tried his heart out, put himself about, but just didn't have the quality to compete. Feel gutted for him.
Whelan - 4 - Whelan was at the other end of the spectrum. When he gets the ball, he isn't just nervous, he is completely terrified.
McGeady - 6 - Worked hard like Duff, got forward a few times, knocked in two crosses, had a few decent touches, but was ultimately swamped.
Cox - 6 - Tried his nuts off, linked up play a few times. Shouldn't be embarrassed at his performance.
Keane - 5 - Worked hard through out the night, but fluffed the one decent and one half chance that he had.
Walters - 6 - Put himself about, ran down some channels, but saw little fruit for his efforts.
McClean - 5 - Lost the ball a few times, but tried hard.
Green - 4 - Like Whelan and Ward, he was just nowhere near good enough to be wearing a green jersey.
He picks the team.Quote:
Originally Posted by jebus
And the "tactics".
Trap saying he had no plan B for when Ireland went 1-0 down.
What did he expect? Is he living in the real world?
And who among our world beaters on the bench or in Norwich would have stopped that happening tonight can I ask?Quote:
Originally Posted by dancinpants
You can blame the Trap for playing Keane & Cox together. Absolutely bonkers.
If Shay Given wasn't 100% he shouldn't have been playing. Irish legend or not.
It hurts to see players who get paid 10-50k a week not able to control a ball or pass it to a team mate.
Our experienced players have been the biggest let down. Dunne has been awful.
Has the RTE panel been harsh? I thought Roy Keane was spot on with his analysis.
what did keane say. the rte lads havent been harsh at all basically said we hadnt a hope to begin with
Does anyone need any extra convincing (after that performance against Spain) that possession is 99% of the game in football. Sure, goals win games but the Ireland v Spain game just illustrated how many chances can be created by the best possession team in the world verus that which gives away the ball the most.
Our first major tournament was 24 years ago. We did a lot under Jack because he recognised the fact that we couldn't maintain possession. He came up with a game plan and it worked wonders. And just to think some people still ridicule Jack to this day. In my mind he was a genius.
And speaking of geniuses, Roy Keane was also a genius.
He managed to pull together a bunch of players (better than that assembled tonight) and made them actually pass the ball and place a premium on not giving it away. We used to go to places like Holland and Portugal and have a real go at them.
And to think Roy was ridiculed and still is to this day.
So where to from here?
Major surgery is needed to our brains really. We have got to stop giving the ball away. It's our friend, when you keep it and moved it from player to player good things happen (as we all saw today).
Until the FAI hires some really good foreign coaches who can teach this aspect of the game to our youngsters, we are doomed.
Perhaps given the headline of this thread, Giovanni Trapattoni pales into insignificance as one who wasn't the best Irish manager of all time. Certainly I would take issue with him over his choice of midfielders. But that's small potatoes. The larger picture shows that we have to make radical changes to our game so as never to be embarassed like that again.
So you think that was our strongest possible starting 11?Quote:
Originally Posted by jebus
so good you said it twiceQuote:
Originally Posted by mark12345
He picked them? There are better players sitting at home who haven't even been considered loyalty is one thing stupidity is another.Quote:
Originally Posted by jebus
good shout dancy pants, at least i got to be positive for half an hour before the match and the first 3 minsQuote:
Originally Posted by dancinpants
Quote:
Originally Posted by mark12345
You can't win possession unless you mark player and close them down.
We don't do this we just chase the ball around the pitch, you don't have to chase if you mark players because you are already where you need to be.
If we marked them 1 on 1 they would struggle to string 3 passes together, not the 30 they do when we mark space.
WE just tend to vaguely mark space somewhere in the vacinity of the goal in the van hope they will run into it.
When we did close them down low and behold they lost the ball""
We also looked tired and lethargic, I wonder if Trap has over trained them?
Yeah, because no one was listening the first time
I'm not as concerned about the tactics as I am about the lack of bottle and drive. We were always a team that was better than the sum if its parts in 1990, 1994, 2002, even the botched play offs against Turkey, Belgium. These last two games we've looked just like a haphazard collection of players. In my opinion only Andrews has really given 110% in these two games