How to beat France over two legs...

[Zizou]

If I were in the shoes of the Trap, here's how I'd go about taking down the mighty French...

My starting 11 would be: Given, O'Shea, Kilbane, Dunne, St. Ledger, Whelan, Andrews, Duff, Hunt, Keane, Folan.

I'd suffocate the French with a high tempo first twenty minutes, sacrificing any glitzy or even decent football in order to put the sh1ts up Mister Henry and co.
I'd order St.Ledger to foul him at least twice in the first 5 mins as refs are slow to take out the cards in these big games. Then have Dunne give him a belt after half hour, maybe even off the ball. We must be dirty.
It's essential. We can't mix it with them football wise and hard and dirty is exactly how the french will fall. I'd instruct every player we have to learn how to say 'your sister and wife are uglier than your mother' in french and repeat it over and over and over and over... After the worst 0-0 in history we go over there, do the same again, only add our boys saying 'your sister is so fat I roll over twice and I'm still on the b1tch' in French again of course..
We sneak a 1-0 against a fuming French 11, and go to South Africa..

Simple..

[ifk101]

Is that you Zinedine? I thought you'd be shouting for the French.

[Zizou]

Is that you Zinedine? I thought you'd be shouting for the French.

I am in fact his biggest Irish fan..

[Stuttgart88]

I think any talk of a "Roy Keane-on-Overmars" type tackle to set an early tone is misguided.

Keane was a giant of a character who referees were probably a bit intimidaated by. We have nobody like that now.

Refereers will be looking for no excuses to gift advantages to the French, especially if they have any ambitions of refereeing at the finals.

[youngirish]

I think any talk of a "Roy Keane-on-Overmars" type tackle to set an early tone is misguided.

Keane was a giant of a character who referees were probably a bit intimidaated by. We have nobody like that now.

Refereers will be looking for no excuses to gift advantages to the French, especially if they have any ambitions of refereeing at the finals.

I feel fairly certain both refs have been taken into Mr Platini's and Mr Blatter's offices and been given detailed instructions in this regard already.

[Dun Laoire]

Croke Park needs to be a cauldren of hate this saturday. If we're not on the ball we gotta be booing, whistling, hissing, whatever.......... we're too nice in fairness. when the game is over we can go back to playing with our blow up hammers and what have ye but just for those 90 mins we gotta be a different animal.

[mkbucks]

Croke Park needs to be a cauldren of hate this saturday. If we're not on the ball we gotta be booing, whistling, hissing, whatever.......... we're too nice in fairness. .

I agree with this, were gonna have 80,000. Lets make the french players look back at this venue and think WTF happened!!

[Murfinator]

Croke Park needs to be a cauldren of hate this saturday. If we're not on the ball we gotta be booing, whistling, hissing, whatever.......... we're too nice in fairness. when the game is over we can go back to playing with our blow up hammers and what have ye but just for those 90 mins we gotta be a different animal.

This, I'm all for being sporting but this is as close to a war as you can get without people being killed and we can expect no favors from the french crowd on wednesday! Cheers, boos whatever, we just need to be as loud and in their face as possible. The Irish crowd usually does this for 10 minutes or so then dies down unless something happens, that can't happen this time. We need to be at it for the full 90 minutes.

[Zizou]

But it has to come from the players lads. If they are up for it, the fans will follow..
Kick it and we will come...

[FahyForever]

I think threads like this one, and a few others in the Ireland forum, reveal how terrified Irish fans are about this game. Deliberate, pre-meditated fouls, off-the-ball attacks, personal insults, sleep-deprivation tactics, creating a 'cauldron of hate', meaningless statistics (ie over the past thirty years our record against them is dead even) are hardly what's called upon to win a game over 180+ minutes with any degree of dignity. If I heard that Irish fans were camped outside the french hotel banging drums or whatever I would be disgusted. In a perverse way, I think the way forward is something the man who created this thread suggested, albeit in a slightly different way:

'it has to come from the players lads. If they are up for it, the fans will follow...'

If the team play according to their strengths, with passion and grit, the fans will be motivated anyway and a result is possible. Surely that's the only way to win?

[Dun Laoire]

I think threads like this one, and a few others in the Ireland forum, reveal how terrified Irish fans are about this game. Deliberate, pre-meditated fouls, off-the-ball attacks, personal insults, sleep-deprivation tactics, creating a 'cauldron of hate', meaningless statistics (ie over the past thirty years our record against them is dead even) are hardly what's called upon to win a game over 180+ minutes with any degree of dignity. If I heard that Irish fans were camped outside the french hotel banging drums or whatever I would be disgusted. In a perverse way, I think the way forward is something the man who created this thread suggested, albeit in a slightly different way:

'it has to come from the players lads. If they are up for it, the fans will follow...'

If the team play according to their strengths, with passion and grit, the fans will be motivated anyway and a result is possible. Surely that's the only way to win?

haha, o.k the cauldron of hate was a bit strong. what i'm saying is we gotta be a really tough 12th man. Lets be honest here, It does make the difference. Of course it's the 11 on the pitch but the 12th man must play it's role too.


and yes i'm terrified!

[foureyes]

If I were in the shoes of the Trap, here's how I'd go about taking down the mighty French...

My starting 11 would be: Given, O'Shea, Kilbane, Dunne, St. Ledger, Whelan, Andrews, Duff, Hunt, Keane, Folan.

I'd suffocate the French with a high tempo first twenty minutes, sacrificing any glitzy or even decent football in order to put the sh1ts up Mister Henry and co.
I'd order St.Ledger to foul him at least twice in the first 5 mins as refs are slow to take out the cards in these big games. Then have Dunne give him a belt after half hour, maybe even off the ball. We must be dirty.
It's essential. We can't mix it with them football wise and hard and dirty is exactly how the french will fall. I'd instruct every player we have to learn how to say 'your sister and wife are uglier than your mother' in french and repeat it over and over and over and over... After the worst 0-0 in history we go over there, do the same again, only add our boys saying 'your sister is so fat I roll over twice and I'm still on the b1tch' in French again of course..
We sneak a 1-0 against a fuming French 11, and go to South Africa..

Simple..

we're not a dirty team, and i don't think trap would ever send a team out to act like that. i will agree though that the first 20-25 minutes are very important - we need to come out all guns blazing and try and nick a goal, and i expect that's how they will come out.

my concern is we'll either a) score and then sit back and france will get a leveller or b) fail to score in that spell then france get into the game and nick a goal in the second half.

best case scenario is we score an early one and then catch france on the break. i'm not sure we have enough quality or the right setup to counter attack successfully though.

[paul_oshea]

Why dont ye all do yer bit for your country and fridayy night go down in your hundreds outside the hotel and just keep singing all night long, and banging drums etc etc. That would be a reall green ARMY doing yer bit for yer country.

Obviouslly I would be there but i dont get in until saturday.

[tetsujin1979]

I'd prefer to beat them on the pitch, rather than because of anything that was done to the team hotel/bus/food/water before the game TBH

[SuperDave]

I think threads like this one, and a few others in the Ireland forum, reveal how terrified Irish fans are about this game. Deliberate, pre-meditated fouls, off-the-ball attacks, personal insults, sleep-deprivation tactics, creating a 'cauldron of hate', meaningless statistics (ie over the past thirty years our record against them is dead even) are hardly what's called upon to win a game over 180+ minutes with any degree of dignity. If I heard that Irish fans were camped outside the french hotel banging drums or whatever I would be disgusted. In a perverse way, I think the way forward is something the man who created this thread suggested, albeit in a slightly different way:

'it has to come from the players lads. If they are up for it, the fans will follow...'

If the team play according to their strengths, with passion and grit, the fans will be motivated anyway and a result is possible. Surely that's the only way to win?

Dignity? On an internets forum? Are you mad?

[Shilts]

France are 3/1 on to go through. They are a top 10 FIFA seed for the last 10 years. We have got a terrible draw in this world cup.
Effectively we were/are required to knock out one of the 2 finalists from the last world cup finals. (In the last world cup the only team to do this won the whole thing - Italy).

It would be our greatest achievement to qualify for SA.
Can we do it? The bookies don't lose often - but occassionally there is an upset.
We can't afford to concede on sat.
Easier said than done though.
I think a 0-0 on sat is a good result to bring to Paris.
We can't get too fancy over the 2 legs and get caught on the break like against Italy late on.
We should line up with 2 banks of four with 1 of the forwards helping out a lot in midfield.
We will have to hurt them at set pieces.
I don't think we will create much in open play.
Defend for our lives is our best chance and hope we stick one from a set piece over the 2 legs, preferably in Paris as an away goal is more precious.
How about pens? Anelka missed in Moscow, could it happen again?

C'MON IRELAND!!!

[OwlsFan]

A nice wet, cold and windy day will do for starters. A bit like today but only worse. That will be a great help.

[Zizou]

I reckon a bit of Egyptian fans thinking is needed!!! Anyone seen it this morning??

Madness....

[seanfhear]

I hope you have a tactic that takes into place losing the first leg 1-0 to an away goal. Lulling them into a false sence of security (devilishly clever)

[Zizou]

I for one think we still have a great chance. Here's why:
1:The French are bottlers at home.
2:We are at our best when facing big nations, with no expectations of us.
3:Scotland won there recently.
4:They conceded to all opponents at home in the group, (except Faroes)
5:With Trap, anything is possible.
So here's to 0-1 to our boys, with the best keeper in World football putting us through on pens!!

OLE, OLE OLE OLE....