Cyprus V Republic of Ireland - Saturday, 5th September 2009 - World Cup 2010 Q

[old git]

Anyone care about the Australia result now?
thought not

yes ,, the idea of friendlys is to try new options / players and build up team performance to next competitive match... ireland were very poor against australia and a lot of people put it down to a bit of early season rustiness and some players more worried about weekend priemership matches ... roll on cyprus and i would say at times ireland played worse than the australia match ... but the 3 points were the main agenda but would still like to see ireland play a bit of composed football at times

[Stuttgart88]

I don't think the idea of a pre-season friendly before a crucial WC game is to try new options. It's to give a dress reherasal for the real thing.

Now the points are in the bag there's nothing to be gained by playing the same XI that started against Cyprus just a few days later, unless it's to get them to have more confidence to play proper football. The SA game is a chance to check out the fringes and see if any new combos click. I think Trap has played it quite well. I'm glad the starting XI will have a different look to it on Tuesday.

I think we can still predict the starting XI against Italy but there may be injuries and there may be a few options from the bench unearthed.

[tricky_colour]

Anyone notice how odd our first goal was?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WS5p9r3SiOA
( about 4-7 seconds)

It's like pinball, it bounces off three 'bumpers' (defenders) left right left-right
and them Doyles 'flipper' scoops it into the target for a bonus!!

[jbyrne]

Dunne has really gone off form. Maybe he needs a club manager who believes in him. Ever since Mark Hughes won the lottery he has undermined Dunnes confidence.

I really hope Dunne can get back to the player he was 12/18 months ago.

or three months ago against bulgaria and five months ago against italy

[Stuttgart88]

I'm confident a few games under his belt at Villa and he'll be back on form against Italy. He was poor last night and against Australia, but he was sheer quality in Sofia.

[Manc Irish Wolf]

Jesus Manc, I hope you had a few quid on that!!!

Sadly not - I stupidly prefer to leave my pre-match predictions to Internet messageboards, rather than for financial gain down the bookies. The elation that followed Keano's goal more than made up for it though.

Job done with the three points. Didn't play particularly well and it was frustrating to see various players play below par. However, the well drilled team unit that has been built seems to accomodate for mistakes well and thankfully we weren't, and haven't to date, been severly punished. The defence do have a bit of a worrying tendency for unnecessary errors. Glad to see Doyle have a good game and think his partnership with Keane is a key strength - would like to see Keogh tested with Doyle on Tuesday, as think that the pair of them could stretch defenders well which could work well if the wingers come inside, whereas folan for all his physicality and toil appears more of a spoiler up front.

Crying out for Stephen Reid to come back in which case we will hopefully have more of an option through the middle. Whelan and Andrews do offer a useful threat with long range strikes from deep though. The emergence of another box to box player is essential - hopefully McCann and Gibson can stake a late claim - although would love to see Andy Reid come back into the fold. Think that we are coming to predictable with the wingers, who were getting double marked and nullified too easily.

Also, not happy about the lulls in tempo. To quote a wise man we need to put 'em under pressure. Strategies are all good and well, however to me it's just not in the national psyche to sit back under attack - how many defensive boxers have Ireland ever had? (Apart from Andy Lee) - that said, I do think that we have an issue when it comes to dominating teams. It might come with confidence - but would love to see us doing it the easy way for once.

Overjoyed overall though. Definitely think that Old Trap is a lucky charm for us though. He has brought the team on immensely, created an effective formula, got the players well drilled and given us a great foundation for success, however we are definitely getting the breaks (can't be a coincidence that he's born on Paddy's day). Ordinarily I'd be fretting at 1-1, but was completely calm as I knew we'd score. Some things are just born to be and the more this campaign progresses, the more I'm convinced that we are going to qualify.

In Trap we Trust.

[geysir]

I wonder what the play statistics were in the second half?
I thought we had about 80% of the ball. Whelan and Andrews virtually nullified Cyprus as attacking threat. No real shaky moments, probably St ledger getting that header all wrong was one but at least there was plenty of cover.
I thought Dunne was blatantly dragged to the ground for that injury time free.
Robbie deserved motm for his 2nd half performance.
No wonder the Cypriot manager was in a foul mood afterwards.

[Wexford Delboy]

I wonder what the play statistics were in the second half?
I thought we had about 80% of the ball. Whelan and Andrews virtually nullified Cyprus as attacking threat. No real shaky moments, probably St ledger getting that header all wrong was one but at least there was plenty of cover.
I thought Dunne was blatantly dragged to the ground for that injury time free.
Robbie deserved motm for his 2nd half performance.
No wonder the Cypriot manager was in a foul mood afterwards.

duff was motm always offered an outlet imho

[mypost]

Shocking but we're always shocking away to Cyprus. Those pesky technically superior minnows. I guess you have to compare apples to apples so compared to previous performances away to Cyprus it wasn't the worst.

Anyhow we got our revenge I suppose.

When Italy scrape a win in Cyprus, we're supposed to hail their World Champion resolve. When we scrape a win in Cyprus, it's because we're shyte.

We went there to get 3 points and we got them. Stop complaining lads.

[Scram]

A few of us, Stuts etc. spot on with 1-2 predictions.

Commiserations to "fans" like Weldohinho with pathetic hopeful predictions like 2 and 3-0 to Cyprus. These posters should be ignored completely.

We really are riding our luck still

[elroy]

Here lads, check out this photo from other night, proves why Shay is so good......hes got three hands

[DeLorean]

When Italy scrape a win in Cyprus, we're supposed to hail their World Champion resolve. When we scrape a win in Cyprus, it's because we're shyte.

Most people have been going on about how rubbish Italy are at the moment so nobody was hailing their resolve. Let's hope Bulgaria get a draw against them and we can have a cup final at Croker. Don't really want Bulgaria going there and winning cos it will make little difference to us catching Italy, but a massive difference to Bulgaria catching us.

We went there to get 3 points and we got them. Stop complaining lads.

I'm inclined to agree with you despite giving out like anything for 90mins. We're only Ireland and not even an Ireland with a particularly good side so we should be delighted with the position we're in. Undefeated with all our away games played in a big achievement, regardless of the torture along the way.

[paul_oshea]

In terms of results so far, how have they differed from Kerrs campaign? I know we only finished with 14 or so, but we didnt lose away under kerr either and we drew a lot of home games too, bar the france result.....we beat cyprus away and home, we drew with israel away and home, and that could yet be the same with montenegro, so our results wont be much different to how we were under kerr. Arguably now we have a more experienced Team also, with a few new finds such as doyle, st ledger etc. I never fancy us winning when we really need to win lads, i dont think we are capable, and im on about montenegro game here as oppossed to Italy, as we dont actually need to win that game, but we might need to beat montenegro.

[Stuttgart88]

Ordinarily I'd be fretting at 1-1, but was completely calm as I knew we'd score.

Me too, oddly enough. I was quite relaxed at 75 / 80 mins.

[paul_oshea]

I certainly wasn't i kept moving like i was on speed or something.

[shakermaker1982]

I wonder what the play statistics were in the second half?
I thought we had about 80% of the ball. Whelan and Andrews virtually nullified Cyprus as attacking threat. No real shaky moments, probably St ledger getting that header all wrong was one but at least there was plenty of cover.
I thought Dunne was blatantly dragged to the ground for that injury time free.
Robbie deserved motm for his 2nd half performance.
No wonder the Cypriot manager was in a foul mood afterwards.

I've not seen the % broken down by halfs but taken the whole match into account here are some interesting facts from the Telegraph:

Possession:

Cyprus 51% Ireland 49%

Territory:

Cyprus 52 % Ireland 48%

Successful Passing:

Cyprus 72% Ireland 61%


I have to admit I thought the game was fairly even over the 90 minutes. I wouldn't say we had 80% of the ball in the second half but I may be wrong. I'll have a look on the net to see if I can find a breakdown.

[DeLorean]

In terms of results so far, how have they differed from Kerrs campaign? I know we only finished with 14 or so, but we didnt lose away under kerr either and we drew a lot of home games too, bar the france result.....we beat cyprus away and home, we drew with israel away and home, and that could yet be the same with montenegro, so our results wont be much different to how we were under kerr. Arguably now we have a more experienced Team also, with a few new finds such as doyle, st ledger etc. I never fancy us winning when we really need to win lads, i dont think we are capable, and im on about montenegro game here as oppossed to Italy, as we dont actually need to win that game, but we might need to beat montenegro.

Yeah but Kerr took over a team that had qualified for the previous WC. I know they had a disasterous Euro Qualifying campaign but I think that was due to the fall out from Saipan and retirement of Roy Keane. Trappatoni has a lot less to work with. I don't think a midfield of Andrews and Whelan can be measured to a midfield that includes Roy Keane, which Kerr had for most of the big matches anyway. Trappatoni took over at a stage where we were probably at our lowest ebb in the past 20-30 years. We finished 12pts short of the Czechs and 10pts short of the Germans in the last campaign and we're challenging for top spot this time. I'm not saying everything is rosey but it's an improvement beyond belief. It doesn't really matter how he compares to Kerr (who for the most part didn't do a particularly bad job anyway) as he had a lot bigger job to do.

[ifk101]

We played a lot of long aimless balls in the second half so I'm not surprised Cyprus had more possession than us. Considering the midget that was playing in goals for Cyprus, I was disappointed we couldn't get more crosses in.

[geysir]

here are some interesting facts from the Telegraph:


Territory:

Cyprus 52 % Ireland 48%

Strange,
Sky Sports has us with 59% of the territory over the 90mins.

[shakermaker1982]

Strange,
Sky Sports has us with 59% of the territory over the 90mins.

looking through the sites there seems to be a range of figures on possesion! Statistics eh?!