Your glass is quarter full.
Just remember Cyprus and San Marino during Stan's era.
Feel better?
2-0 tonight.
But any win will do for my accumulator.
My glass is three quarters empty at this point so plumping for a standard 1-0 victory, disjointed performance with a Robbie goal and a bit of a kicking for the manager to follow.
Ou-est le Centre George Pompidou?
Your glass is quarter full.
Just remember Cyprus and San Marino during Stan's era.
Feel better?
2-0 tonight.
But any win will do for my accumulator.
DID YOU NOTICE A SIGN OUTSIDE MY HOUSE...?
Not really. Those are horrible memories for a Friday morning.Originally Posted by BonnieShels
Ou-est le Centre George Pompidou?
The kicking is going to follow no matter what happens. If we win, well then it's only Kazakhstan, we're expected to beat the likes of them. If we lose or draw, then they'll call for his head.
And quite rightly. We're not going to qualify for Brazil if we drop points against Kazakhstan. We need a maximum haul of points against Kazakhstan and the Faroes.
Of course. My kicking was predicted off the basis of a poor-ish performance, rather than the general kicking that's going to happen.
Ou-est le Centre George Pompidou?
Is there any kind of criticism that you will not dismiss as part of an 'agenda'?
constructive criticism. calling for a manager's resignation is pointless knee jerk reactionism (that's a word right?) .Calling for his resignation, citing a number of valid replacements, backed up with research showing the improvements each one would make seems to be beyond the majority of journalists, not only in football but across sport.
4-0 to Ireland.
Yeh you can get it anywhere I think, only takes a fiver to have free streams from then on
- - - - - - - Westwood - - - - - - - - -
O'Shea - St. Ledger - O'Dea - Ward - -
- - - - - McCarthy - Whelan - - - - - - -
- - - Cox - - - Keane - - - McGeady - - -
- - - - - - - - Walters - - - - - - - - - -
If we're going for this kind of shape tonight, with a bit of interchanging between Walters, Cox and Keane, it could be interesting. Keane said that he might be asked to play a bit deeper. However, if we're stuck with the flat 4-4-2 with Keane playing off the last defender's shoulder and Cox marooned out wide, under instruction to put in crosses, then it could be a long night, but this is encouraging from Keane;
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...323696816.htmlKeane, who continues as captain for the new campaign, reckons Jon Walters’s role will be similar enough to the one usually played over the last few years by Kevin Doyle and that his own will not change much even if, he suggests: “I’ll probably play a little bit deeper than I normally would in order to help the midfield a bit.”
Behind him, though, he acknowledges that things will be a bit different without Damien Duff and one of the side’s more experienced central midfielders. “Simon’s a striker who can play on the right but he’s not a natural winger so he’ll probably tuck in a bit more.
How can it be a flat 442?
From the time the team was announced and some roles explained, it's clear that it's anything but a flat 442.
Change for the sake of change.
Why? Are the two mutually exclusive? Surely there are far better candidates that could be dropped from the squad to accomodate some new young players other than Duff and Given - two of our best players for the last 10 - 15 years. Andy Keogh, Stephen Ward, Paul McShane and Darren O'Dea are all far more deserving candidates to make way for any new emerging talent.
Not when they've been directly replaced in the starting line-up by Cox (25) and Westwood (27).
The arguments aren't mutually exclusive, particularly when one of the players involved is a goalkeeper. I don't hear anybody criticizing Trap for not having a young goalkeeper in the squad. I'm sure people would be more than content to see a goalkeeping trio of Given, Westwood and Forde/Randolph, picking Randolph due to age factors perhaps.
In relation to Cox, he has shown enough to deserve a place in the squad. Drop Keogh if there's a viable new/young player doing enough to justify selection. Keogh has been performing in the Championship, but as a striker. Not as a winger, which is where Trap will play him should he feel the need. Were Duff involved, Cox would move to the bench and Keogh would be gone. I don't think anyone would argue with this.
Last edited by Olé Olé; 07/09/2012 at 12:40 PM.
It all depends on how they play. If all the little mini-triangles work and players show for the ball and we can actually move it around at a high tempo then this XI could do just fine. Robbie dropping deeper might be the catalyst for more cohesive play. Our full-backs have to interact with our CMs and our CMs have to keep the ball rolling. However my fear is that we've heard the "Robbie dropping deeper" line before and it has never really worked out like that. I don't think he has ever really looked like a "Totti like" trequartista, he's never really looked composed enough.
Far too often recently our full-backs or CBs have launched the ball long to Doyle or Walters, losing possession cheaply and we end up chasing shadows. We no longer have the invaluable "out ball" to Duff who always did something useful with it, even if it was only to bring it under control and buy a few seconds of possession, or draw a foul. I'm hoping that McCarthy becomes this composed recipient of the out-ball now.
This is a non-partisan appraisal of how I see it. I find it hard to see how anyone, pro-, anti- or undecided about Trap could disagree with this to any huge extent.
Personally I think personnel tweaks and tactical tweaks can help overcome what I think are our weaknesses but we've argued this dozens of times before and let's see how we fare tonight before going into it again.
Like those who underwhelmed in Hungary last night?
what better option is O'Dea keeping out of the squad?
just read this on When Saturday Comes: http://www.wsc.co.uk/wsc-daily/1152-...e-ireland-fans
It's the type of writing we need more of.
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