Republic of Ireland V Scotland - Saturday, 13th June 2015 - Euro 2016 Qualifier

[paul_oshea]

Stutts I didn't reply to that message, its completely different:

CTP very happy with that as a half even minus a goal....good to watch...who will come on.
Stutts : He told you so nobody else saw it.

I have no more messages after 5.45 from me! But i checked the other groups and it was another group i sent it to, thought i'd sent it to you and CTP.

[Kingdom]

The only thing that is giving me some hope is that Scotland have messed up in Georgia when in a commanding group position previously. They lost 2-0 in Sept under McLeish when Georgia has a 17 year old in goal, and a 16 yr old up front. Around 2008 I think?

[SkStu]

lots of stuff

very similar to my bullet point summary. Just a lot longer. And better!

[Stuttgart88]

Great chat here about James McCarthy

http://www.the42.ie/analysis-was-jam...74738-Jun2015/

especially the bit by Giles and Whelan in analysis of a GER v ARG game (though not the WC Final as the caption said?).

The last Irish midfielder I remember carrying the ball forward was Steven Reid.

[Stuttgart88]

The only thing that is giving me some hope is that Scotland have messed up in Georgia when in a commanding group position previously. They lost 2-0 in Sept under McLeish when Georgia has a 17 year old in goal, and a 16 yr old up front. Around 2008 I think?

Momentum is kind of self-reinforcing though. If you have a habit of getting what you need, you get what you need. Scotland are doing that by hook or by crook. We don't. I don't think Scotkand are that good but they're good enough to get what they need from here on. They'll scrape by in Georgia and get a point from their other home games, maybe more.

[paul_oshea]

Yes, and even so, we have proven that we are not capable of taking our chances or doing what we need to do, regardless of what other teams around us do.

[Crosby87]

MOL as victim
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/f...laying-5884343

[Stuttgart88]

I wouldn't be rushing to defend him.

[Kingdom]

Momentum is kind of self-reinforcing though. If you have a habit of getting what you need, you get what you need. Scotland are doing that by hook or by crook. We don't. I don't think Scotkand are that good but they're good enough to get what they need from here on. They'll scrape by in Georgia and get a point from their other home games, maybe more.

I don't like contradicting you, but have a gawk at this. Hope....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_E...ifying_Group_B

http://www.uefa.com/uefaeuro/season=...scotland+hopes

Klaus Toppmoller. another decent manager we would pooh-pooh

[paul_oshea]

If that group followed we would need 11 points, as they would have 19 points from there...

[tetsujin1979]

Watching the game, especially the last 20 minutes or so, it occurred to me that we're desperately missing a finisher up front. Every other position, almost every other role (creative CM, holding midfielder, attacking full back, etc), seems to have a first choice player, and at least one solid back up. But there's nobody in the squad, or even the extended Irish setup that you can say if he's in the box, it's a goal, or even a shot on target. Walters and Murphy are solid target men. Long can (and has) scored goal of the season contenders, but will also miss relatively simple chances in the same game.

Marshall's a decent keeper but we never really tested him. Keane came on and drilled the ball at the goal with one of his first touches of the ball, it was saved, but it was an attempt on goal. Other than Whelan's long range shot, did any other player take that kind of opportunity - I'm not counting Murphy's saved chance because that was never going to be anything other than a shot, Keane shot even though he had the option of passing.

One piece of commentary that stuck in my head for years was from the 1-1 home draw with Portugal in 2001. George Hamilton repeatedly mentioned that Roy Keane had been scoring goals in training, and scored in that game, so I guess the real question is why were the players so shot-shy on Saturday?

On this topic, there's a pretty damning statistic from the international games across May and June

       Games Goals
Senior   2     1
U21      2     2
U18      2     1
U17      3     0
Total    9     4

That's one (offside) goal by the seniors, two goals scored by the U21's (while conceding five) and one scored by the U18s in two games against Luxembourg. In future, where are the goals going to come from?

[Stuttgart88]

Yeah, I was watching England yesterday and anytime Rooney had the ball within 25 yards you knew he was at least considering shooting.

[Kingdom]

Eoin Doyle or Daryl Murphy, neither are good enough, so i wouldn't agree with the last couple of paragraphs, the pl is better than the championship also, you cant legitimately argue that either. Overall good points well made.

I won't say Doyle is good enough, but I can't say that he isn't, because frankly we don't know. Look at Mikey Drennan: very good underage for us, excellent in the youth CL for Villa (along with Grealish, Carruthers, Burke, Williams) didn't pick up a senior contract, back at home with Rovers, tearing it up and would be no surprise to see him head off to Bristol City or the like next season and bang them in at the Championship.
That's different from the path Doyle is on, but it's worth referencing, because these are guys that we cannot necessarily discount. But from what I've seen of him doyle is a different kind of forward to what we have, a bigger version of David Connolly perhaps, and to be honest, in Robbie's absence, that is exactly what we're going to need.

On the whole PL v Championship thing, it isn't black and white. If you remove the top 10 sides in the PL, they are the ones with the charisma and generally good football, but they're also the teams packed with the foreign stars. The remainder, generally speaking, are either gash to begin with, or cannot attract the type of player necessary to break that glass ceiling into the top ten. And when the core that you rely on to maintain survival dissipates after 2/3 seasons, you're done. We all know these teams. Watford will be one more than likely. Sunderland probably. QPR definitely. Palace quite probably.

I would reckon here and now, that Bournemouth will do quite well next season. I don't think they'll be near relegation. They've a good manager, and they play football that will make mugs out of some teams in the PL. The other two I would worry about. Whereas I reckon if you put Boro in the PL now, they'd stay up.

Some teams in the Championship cannot grind it out over a harsh season. Derby, Brentford, Forest. There are sides that will always be yo-yo's between the two divisions. Good footballing sides that don't have the resources or the hardness about them to kill off the nastier elements of the Chship that grind you down over 46 matches. The way I see it is that the main difference between the PL and the Chship is that the calibre of foreign player is less numerous, and less capable in the chship. In the Championship, the top 3 and Derby excepted, you could have interchanged any of the next 6/7/8 sides.

I suppose another way of saying it would be that the foreign players in the PL make the home grown players look better than their respective equivalents in the chship.

We here on this site, know the players playing in England that are eligible for us. If you keep failing with one approach, then take another approach. A bit of humility hasn't hindered the North.

And I'd start by dumping our management team charade, and picking a proper European coach. That, or Eddie Howe. Feck it, Sean O'Driscoll plays better football than Martin O'Neill, but he couldn't possibly be considered.

[Kingdom]

Watching the game, especially the last 20 minutes or so, it occurred to me that we're desperately missing a finisher up front. Every other position, almost every other role (creative CM, holding midfielder, attacking full back, etc), seems to have a first choice player, and at least one solid back up. But there's nobody in the squad, or even the extended Irish setup that you can say if he's in the box, it's a goal, or even a shot on target. Walters and Murphy are solid target men. Long can (and has) scored goal of the season contenders, but will also miss relatively simple chances in the same game.

Marshall's a decent keeper but we never really tested him. Keane came on and drilled the ball at the goal with one of his first touches of the ball, it was saved, but it was an attempt on goal. Other than Whelan's long range shot, did any other player take that kind of opportunity - I'm not counting Murphy's saved chance because that was never going to be anything other than a shot, Keane shot even though he had the option of passing.

One piece of commentary that stuck in my head for years was from the 1-1 home draw with Portugal in 2001. George Hamilton repeatedly mentioned that Roy Keane had been scoring goals in training, and scored in that game, so I guess the real question is why were the players so shot-shy on Saturday?

On this topic, there's a pretty damning statistic from the international games across May and June

       Games Goals
Senior   2     1
U21      2     2
U18      2     1
U17      3     0
Total    9     4

That's one (offside) goal by the seniors, two goals scored by the U21's (while conceding five) and one scored by the U18s in two games against Luxembourg. In future, where are the goals going to come from?

That's a horrible statistic.

[DannyInvincible]

Watching the game, especially the last 20 minutes or so, it occurred to me that we're desperately missing a finisher up front. Every other position, almost every other role (creative CM, holding midfielder, attacking full back, etc), seems to have a first choice player, and at least one solid back up. But there's nobody in the squad, or even the extended Irish setup that you can say if he's in the box, it's a goal, or even a shot on target. Walters and Murphy are solid target men. Long can (and has) scored goal of the season contenders, but will also miss relatively simple chances in the same game.

Marshall's a decent keeper but we never really tested him. Keane came on and drilled the ball at the goal with one of his first touches of the ball, it was saved, but it was an attempt on goal. Other than Whelan's long range shot, did any other player take that kind of opportunity - I'm not counting Murphy's saved chance because that was never going to be anything other than a shot, Keane shot even though he had the option of passing.

One piece of commentary that stuck in my head for years was from the 1-1 home draw with Portugal in 2001. George Hamilton repeatedly mentioned that Roy Keane had been scoring goals in training, and scored in that game, so I guess the real question is why were the players so shot-shy on Saturday?

On this topic, there's a pretty damning statistic from the international games across May and June

       Games Goals
Senior   2     1
U21      2     2
U18      2     1
U17      3     0
Total    9     4

That's one (offside) goal by the seniors, two goals scored by the U21's (while conceding five) and one scored by the U18s in two games against Luxembourg. In future, where are the goals going to come from?

Thought it interesting that of all the teams partaking in the qualifiers, we're the team who have scored the most goals from inside the six-yard box with 5: http://www.rte.ie/sport/soccer/2015/...nd-in-numbers/

[DannyInvincible]

I texted my mates and Stutts and CTP at half time saying i didnt think we had played that well, but i could sense those watching on TV thought we would have, and all my mates texted me saying exactly that. I texted and said we have created absolutely nothing, and we hadn't!

We created a goal and had them under pressure for the entire half.

Darragh Maloney, Liam Brady, Eamon Dunphy, Richard Sadlier (01:42:30 of video), Ken Early, Emmet Malone, Liam Mackey and Vincent Hogan are just a few commentators who were at the game but who were impressed or encouraged by our first-half performance. Dan McDonnell also specifically defended McCarthy's first-half showing. What made you think it was a performance that would have appeared better only on television and why do you think all the aforementioned professionals disagree with you?

Here are the tie-breaking criteria, by the way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_E...ng#Tiebreakers

If two or more teams are equal on points on completion of the group matches, the following tie-breaking criteria are applied:

1. Higher number of points obtained in the matches played among the teams in question;
2. Superior goal difference resulting from the matches played among the teams in question;
3. Higher number of goals scored in the matches played among the teams in question;
4. Higher number of goals scored away from home in the matches played among the teams in question;
5. If, after having applied criteria 1 to 4, teams still have an equal ranking, criteria 1 to 4 are reapplied exclusively to the matches between the teams in question to determine their final rankings. If this procedure does not lead to a decision, criteria 6 to 10 apply;
6. Superior goal difference in all group matches;
7. Higher number of goals scored in all group matches;
8. Higher number of away goals scored in all group matches;
9. Fair play conduct in all group matches (1 point for a single yellow card, 3 points for a red card as a consequence of two yellow cards, 3 points for a direct red card, 4 points for a yellow card followed by a direct red card);
10. Position in the UEFA national team coefficient ranking system;

To determine the best third-placed team, the results against the teams in sixth place are discarded. The following criteria are applied:

1. Higher number of points obtained;
2. Superior goal difference;
3. Higher number of goals scored;
4. Higher number of away goals scored;
5. Fair play conduct in all group matches;
6. Position in the UEFA national team coefficient ranking system;

[Kingdom]

Danny, in terms of our showing thus far under O'Neill, yes, there was lots to be positive about. But it wasn't like we were doing anything better than under Mick McCarthy against a peer. It would be less than par with Trappatoni at our best under him. And this is over a year into the dynamic duo's reign. That's where the problem lies.

And Scotland were very much under par. Whether that was because of us or themselves remains to be seen, but when they lifted things, we became a non-force.

[Stuttgart88]

That's a horrible statistic.

ardee Bhoy and I watched the ENG u21 v IRL u21 game recently and we didn't see much cause for optimism. Only later we found out that our lads were two years younger than England's. Isn't that how we tend to do things? We do t make it easy for ourselves at underage level.

Historically I think Irish managers since Mick have looked at club and division first and foremost. At the margins I think a bolder approach could be applied. Conservatism on and off the pitch has been the theme of the decade, with the obvious exception of Stan's end of season tours!

[Stuttgart88]

Also, interesting that neither CTP nor I is what Paul would call a "mate".

[Stuttgart88]

Danny, in terms of our showing thus far under O'Neill, yes, there was lots to be positive about. But it wasn't like we were doing anything better than under Mick McCarthy against a peer. It would be less than par with Trappatoni at our best under him. And this is over a year into the dynamic duo's reign. That's where the problem lies.

And Scotland were very much under par. Whether that was because of us or themselves remains to be seen, but when they lifted things, we became a non-force.

i think we have the ability to make any opponent look sh1t. We make ourselves look pretty sh1t too unfortunately.

Your point about being a year in is key. It's actually quite a bit more than a year. Still no idea of best team and still only playing in fits and starts. However, it'd be hypocritical of me to slate the selection. For a long time now I have thought we could dispense with our addiction to orthodox width in midfield and pick a flattish midfield three, plus a Hoolahan type player. He did this and I won't fault him for it. The biggy for me was Long. I'd have been happy for him to partner either Murphy or Walters but I'd never have gone with Murphy and Walters.