Post Match and looking ahead

[geysir]

Ronnie Rosenthall

[Stuttgart88]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7dxno9_ixg


(How do you attach this so the picture appears, with the "play" arrow?)

Quality goal. What a first touch and what a shot.

[Closed Account]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7dxno9_ixg


(How do you attach this so the picture appears, with the "play" arrow?)

Quality goal. What a first touch and what a shot.

Put the youtube id, i.e i7dxno9_ixg, in [.yt] [./yt] tags (remove . )

[geysir]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7dxno9_ixg


(How do you attach this so the picture appears, with the "play" arrow?)

Quality goal. What a first touch and what a shot.

Just in case for others, i´ll replicate the original board instructions

For example: http://youtube.com/watch?v=OOprXKpuVRc.
Usage
Example Usage [yt]OOprXKpuVRc[yt]

[geysir]

Could our commentator be likewise struck speechless

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqYaz...eature=related

[monsexile]

The French media are playing up the fact that there will be 25,000 Irish in the stadium. Really looking forward to this one now. Quite confident that we will score but not so sure we'll keep a clean sheet. 2-1 with a late winner with no time for a comeback would be perfect.
http://www.football365.fr/france/equ...gacement.shtml

[dynamo kerry]

arguably the french lads touch helped kostadinov there

that bulgarian team went on to great things.. intimidating but still inspiring.


I'm torn between thinking for the future and focussing on wednesday. I've decided to stick with the next game and worry about the euros later. We only need to score once to make it very interesting. And the great thing is the french can never have more than 1 away goal.

We can have 2! (maybe)

[Greenbod]

And the great thing is the french can never have more than 1 away goal.

We can have 2! (maybe)

This is exactly why I always think it's better to play away second......we're going into a deciding 90 min game where our goals count for more than theirs!

[dynamo kerry]

You can distinguish between hope and optimism?

No matter who we have played at Croke Park we have given them 80% of the ball so it's no special achievement for France to dominate the ball.
I'm sure Bulgaria were very confident of beating us in the return game in Sofia.

hope means you believe things could be ok

optimism suggests they will be...

I am optimistic that I will be hopeful ...

[dr_peepee]

You can distinguish between hope and optimism?

No matter who we have played at Croke Park we have given them 80% of the ball so it's no special achievement for France to dominate the ball.
I'm sure Bulgaria were very confident of beating us in the return game in Sofia.

Let me tell you something my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane...

I wish I could tell you that Andrews fought the good fight, and the Sisters let him be. I wish I could tell you that - but football is no fairy-tale world. He never said who did it, but we all knew. Things went on like that for awhile - matches consists of routine, and then more routine. Every so often, Andy would show up with fresh bruises. The Sisters kept at him - sometimes he was able to fight 'em off, sometimes not. And that's how it went for Andy - that was his routine. I do believe those first leg was the worst for him....

[Dun Laoire]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7dxno9_ixg


(How do you attach this so the picture appears, with the "play" arrow?)

Quality goal. What a first touch and what a shot.

slightly off topic but was that the last game Ginola played for France? Was he blamed by Houllier for sticking the cross in and gifting the ball back to the Bulgarians.

[Den Perry]

I am going to put you on ignore now because it's blatent you know nothing about football.

Andews was our best player in the first half, he did his job, the job he was asked to do, supurbly. He closed down, he put in two supurb crunching tackles in a row on one occassion, do you remember that. He was faultless in the first half. He put his body on the line time after time such as when he was elbowed in the face.

In the second half he tired but was still ok. Anyone who says Andrews was poor in the first half is an idiot and not worth listening to and i don't care who they claim to be. There are a lot of idiots with no knowledge of the game in Ireland masquarading as experts.

Doyle is not up to the task of delivering us a goal. I can explain the technical reasons but I doubt a person of your limited intellect would understand, but for the benefit of others, Doyle receives the ball 90% of the time with his back to goal. That makes the job of scoring much more difficult. The best way to score as a forward is facing goal and running onto a ball, usually over the top or else run onto a knockdown as Keane did in Bari and when he was facing goal. Letting Doyle have the ball to his feet and facing away from goal is pointless. What will he do? Lay it off to some other player of limited ability? Who then lashes a high ball into the box with only Keane to compete against two tall centre backs.

People say Doyle is good at holding the ball up and waiting for suppport. Again that's no use to us. When he holds it up like that, he also holds it up for the French defence to get back into position. That's one of the reasons Doyle is so easy to counter. He has lost a few yards of pace with injury and can't run onto a through ball, hold off players with his strength and score. It won't get any better in the next 3 days.

But of course people like Den Perry have no interest in the technical side of soccer. They are more interested in listening to journos and parroting their obsession with Andy Reid.

Andy Reid would be useless without quick strong forwards to run onto his passes. He has strong forwards to run onto his passes at Sunderland and who are lethal finishers. He has Kenwan Jones to aim his crosses at. We don't have that at Ireland. We don't have any clinical fditers. Our system is not set up to allow our forwards score in big games. They have only scored one between them in our 7 biggest games, and even that was scored when Doyle wasn't on the field.

Emmet, just because a person does not share your views does not entitle you to make the accusations you have.In addition,you criticised me for name-calling on a previous thread, now you are doing exactly that.Then again, it probably shows your lack of intellect, as does your spelling."supurb" - what a dope you are.

[Wolfie]

Most of what's worth being remarked upon has already been said - but we've got to re-iterate the fact that its half-time and this game is still worth fighting for.

If the first leg had have ended nil all - we were going to have to score in Paris anyway!!

Its a massive challenge and the odds are stacked against us but has it ever been any other way in these crucial matches?

If we can replicate our approach as in Bari (albeit against 11 men this time, but you get the point) we could force an equaliser.

The lads put in a monumental effort in Dublin and I was proud of them all. A little bit of luck (possibly a bit more composure too) could easily have yielded a goal from the few chances we got.

Its not over quite yet.

[Den Perry]

I am going to put you on ignore now because it's blatent you know nothing about football.

Andews was our best player in the first half, he did his job, the job he was asked to do, supurbly. He closed down, he put in two supurb crunching tackles in a row on one occassion, do you remember that. He was faultless in the first half. He put his body on the line time after time such as when he was elbowed in the face.

In the second half he tired but was still ok. Anyone who says Andrews was poor in the first half is an idiot and not worth listening to and i don't care who they claim to be. There are a lot of idiots with no knowledge of the game in Ireland masquarading as experts.

Doyle is not up to the task of delivering us a goal. I can explain the technical reasons but I doubt a person of your limited intellect would understand, but for the benefit of others, Doyle receives the ball 90% of the time with his back to goal. That makes the job of scoring much more difficult. The best way to score as a forward is facing goal and running onto a ball, usually over the top or else run onto a knockdown as Keane did in Bari and when he was facing goal. Letting Doyle have the ball to his feet and facing away from goal is pointless. What will he do? Lay it off to some other player of limited ability? Who then lashes a high ball into the box with only Keane to compete against two tall centre backs.

People say Doyle is good at holding the ball up and waiting for suppport. Again that's no use to us. When he holds it up like that, he also holds it up for the French defence to get back into position. That's one of the reasons Doyle is so easy to counter. He has lost a few yards of pace with injury and can't run onto a through ball, hold off players with his strength and score. It won't get any better in the next 3 days.

But of course people like Den Perry have no interest in the technical side of soccer. They are more interested in listening to journos and parroting their obsession with Andy Reid.

Andy Reid would be useless without quick strong forwards to run onto his passes. He has strong forwards to run onto his passes at Sunderland and who are lethal finishers. He has Kenwan Jones to aim his crosses at. We don't have that at Ireland. We don't have any clinical finishers. Our system is not set up to allow our forwards score in big games. They have only scored one between them in our 7 biggest games, and even that was scored when Doyle wasn't on the field.

I think I know more about the technical side than a cretin like you Emmet. Andrews gave the ball away on numerous occasions - passing the ball to your teamate is probably the most basic technical skill in football.I actually think Andrews was good in the first half,and I like the guy,but he was completely over-run in second half.A match is 90 minutes long - probably another "technical" detail of which you seem to be unaware.

[jmurphyc]

Most of what's worth being remarked upon has already been said - but we've got to re-iterate the fact that its half-time and this game is still worth fighting for.

If the first leg had have ended nil all - we were going to have to score in Paris anyway!!

Its a massive challenge and the odds are stacked against us but has it ever been any other way in these crucial matches?

If we can replicate our approach as in Bari (albeit against 11 men this time, but you get the point) we could force an equaliser.

The lads put in a monumental effort in Dublin and I was proud of them all. A little bit of luck (possibly a bit more composure too) could easily have yielded a goal from the few chances we got.

Its not over quite yet.

Precisely. Chances are, we're going out. However, that doesn't mean that we're definitely finished. Everything is against us, and yet, we only need one goal and we're back in the tie. One slip, one mistake, one moment of inspiration, and suddenly, it's game on. It happened in the dying moments of the Germany game in 2002 and it happened in the dying moments of the Italy game in Bari. It's incredibly unlikely that we'll do it, but it was even more unlikely in those situations. If we can keep it level on Wednesday then we're in it until the moment the referee blows the final whistle.

[Den Perry]

Precisely. Chances are, we're going out. However, that doesn't mean that we're definitely finished. Everything is against us, and yet, we only need one goal and we're back in the tie. One slip, one mistake, one moment of inspiration, and suddenly, it's game on. It happened in the dying moments of the Germany game in 2002 and it happened in the dying moments of the Italy game in Bari. It's incredibly unlikely that we'll do it, but it was even more unlikely in those situations. If we can keep it level on Wednesday then we're in it until the moment the referee blows the final whistle.

I agree, we're definitely still in it

[Closed Account 2]

Dammit, it'll never happen now that you said it!!

It happened in Belgrade a few months ago, he came flying off his line and tripped Zigic (or may have been Pantelic) red card and penalty to Serbia (which they scored). At one goal it's never over and were playing France not Italy or Germany - I can't see the French shutting a game out like the Italians or Germans - they have flair but not world class organisation.

We came back against Spain to get a late goal in 2002, we came back against Germany in 2002 with a late goal, we came back in 2009 against Italy in Bari all of those times we grabbed late goals while not at home, we can do the same in France. With Trap we have the best manager we've had in a long time and the French might well underestimate us at their peril.

I just wish someone would tell the players to SHOOT FROM DISTANCE, that is a major weakness for Llloris and if Whelan or Keane gets space they should have a crack.

[jmurphyc]

I just wish someone would tell the players to SHOOT FROM DISTANCE, that is a major weakness for Llloris and if Whelan or Keane gets space they should have a crack.

Andrews managed to get a few shots from distance. The problem is that his accuracy was poor. We were seeminlgy attempting to do so, it's just that it fell to the wrong players.

[Noelys Guitar]

How are French going to approach this game? The French crowd will be demanding they attack us from the off. And I can see them trying to take the **** playing keep ball and going nowhere 1-2's up and down either line. I really hope they go for the killer goal/goals allowing us the chances we will need to score. I believe Duff is made for this type of game. He showed enough in the first half on Saturday to suggest that he can take their right side apart with that match now under his belt. I still feel we did not play particulary well on Saturday. And it is us who can go up the Dunphy/Giles mythical gear.

[Leeside Swagger]

The atmosphere was incredible on Saturday night, I was there for the rugby on Sunday as well, in pretty much the same seats and it was like a library in Croker.

Still in with a reasonable chance if we can keep it tight and get a late goal.