Republic of Ireland V Serbia - Tuesday, 7th September 2021 - 2022 World Cup Qualifier

[brine3]

I desperately wanted Kenny to succeed for a number of reasons, the main one being his man management skills and ability to make players believe they were on a same level as better players. However in a short time he has made us approach matches as though we are Andora or Malta. We played Serbia today, a half decent international team who we traditionally would like to think we are slightly better than. Today we made then look like Brazil and approached the game like we were playing Brazil. Enough is enough

Dusan Tadic would get into the Brazil team.

[SkStu]

Dusan Tadic would get into the Brazil team.

Gudelj is an absolute gem of a player too.

[brine3]

- McGrath looks like he might be a find. Can't put my finger on anything he did particularly well, but he looks the part. There's just something about him..

He plays regular first team football. It might be at St. Mirren, but it's regular first team football. We don't have many players regularly getting their game.

[John83]

Anyone downplaying Serbia needs their head examined: they're a very good side. I expected a narrow defeat after a battling performance; we did better than that by an OG to sneak a not really deserved draw. It's a bit crap that a home result like that against the second seeds is a modestly positive result for us, but that's where we are.

Positives: Bazunu (misjudged rush aside), Omobamidele, Hendrick.
Negatives: Molumby

The next Azerbaijan game is far more important. We have to win that: no wins in three games against Luxembourg and Azerbaijan would really be telling.

[texidub]

Serbia must be really p'eed off with that result. Does their chances no good at all and they must have fancied themselves to win, given our run of results. We were out of qualification contention after the Lux loss, but tonight we had a say in the final outcome of the group. Kenny seemed more confident in the press conference on Monday and in his interview after the Serbia game. More bullish and less overawed by the whole experience.

Small things to build on. (It's the hope that kills you in the end )

[Insidetherock]

Those having a go at Kenny's selections

Name one other international side they'd expect to beat Portugal, Serbia, even Azerbaijan with a team half made up of 19/20/21/22 yr olds?

[SkStu]

The crowd clearly loves that team and is backing what Kenny is trying to do. Maybe the cranks on here are in the minority?

It certainly seems that there is a heck of a lot of support for Kenny, his project and this group of players. Great to see.

[SkStu]

Delightful

[samhaydenjr]

Those having a go at Kenny's selections

Name one other international side they'd expect to beat Portugal, Serbia, even Azerbaijan with a team half made up of 19/20/21/22 yr olds?

Challenge accepted - England! A team featuring Alexander-Arnold, Reece James, Bellingham, Saka, Rice, Mount, Sancho and Greenwood plus 3 others would definitely beat Azerbaijan, probably beat Serbia and likely beat this Portugal side (who only just scraped by a transitional ROI side at home)

OK, in fairness, I looked at a number of other major powers and couldn't see any other team capable of putting out such a strong group of young players so... er... good for England - looks like they may yet get that major tournament victory within the next decade.

Also, I'm still reasonably optimistic that when the Euro 2024 qualifiers start, we'll be able to put out a reasonably strong squad made up entirely of players who are currently aged 16-22

[CraftyToePoke]

Challenge accepted - England! A team featuring Alexander-Arnold, Reece James, Bellingham, Saka, Rice, Mount, Sancho and Greenwood plus 3 others would definitely beat Azerbaijan, probably beat Serbia and likely beat this Portugal side (who only just scraped by a transitional ROI side at home)

And if the other half has several club journeymen who in other eras wouldn't have been near our team, how about then ? The other half incidentally comprises the entire midfield.

[samhaydenjr]

And if the other half has several club journeymen who in other eras wouldn't have been near our team, how about then ? The other half incidentally comprises the entire midfield.

Em... correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't Bellingham, Saka, Rice and Mount all midfielders? I even left out Foden because I thought I was overloading midfield - without him I have eight in that team - I only need England's best two defenders over 22 and England's best goalkeeper to round it out

[samhaydenjr]

One more comment on SK's reign - one of the arguments put forward in his defense is that he needs more time. I don't think any Irish manager has had as much time to prepare for their first major qualifying campaign as Kenny. He had a play-off he shouldn't have had, a friendly against England, and a Nations League campaign. This team should have been ready from the game in Serbia - instead we're facing down the barrel of our worst qualifying campaign in half a century (possibly the first without a victory since then).

That said, if the final three performances actually do build on these last three and yield at least six points and a strong showing against Portugal, then the case can be made to give him another shot

[BOOMSHAKALAKA]

Perhaps your energy would best be expended in quashing that myth in wherever those places are that the myth is being propagated, rather than here, where it isn't.

I didn't think criticism of Kenny and the myths around him were banned from foot.ie?

[Olé Olé]

Delightful

I loved this. He is so capable on the ball, I wonder if playing on the right of a back 3 sees the team gets the most out of him in that regard. Whereas, in a back 4 he would be more restricted. He was more than happy to provide a very wide option for Bazunu, as well as going up the field a little too- like for this pass and his shot.

[BOOMSHAKALAKA]

One more comment on SK's reign - one of the arguments put forward in his defense is that he needs more time. I don't think any Irish manager has had as much time to prepare for their first major qualifying campaign as Kenny. He had a play-off he shouldn't have had, a friendly against England, and a Nations League campaign. This team should have been ready from the game in Serbia - instead we're facing down the barrel of our worst qualifying campaign in half a century (possibly the first without a victory since then).

That said, if the final three performances actually do build on these last three and yield at least six points and a strong showing against Portugal, then the case can be made to give him another shot

As you point out, Kenny had a free crack at euro qualification against a covid hit Slovakia and failed. Finished 9 points behind Finland and 13 behind Wales in the nation's league. Is languishing us second bottom in world cup qualifying miles behind Portugal and Serbia after losing to Luxembourg and drawing with Azerbaijan at home. And all this without scoring many goals, some desperate performances and only one win against Andorra. It really shows that there are those who were going to defend him no matter what. We could lose to Azerbaijan and Luxembourg again, finish bottom of the group and there still will be many saying he should remain in the job.

Some say he's been unlucky. What other manager has had free reign to perform as poorly as he has and still have calls for him to get a new contract? He's one of the luckiest managers ever. For example, previous managers would have been slated for saying we shouldn't be expected to compete with Serbia and Portugal. When Trap and O Neill said similar things, they were lambasted.

He's been given a chance, he's had as many games as Staunton. We all wanted his way to work as it would be good for our future but he has failed and failed miserably. We have to get rid of him before he does more damage and we end up with a long ball merchant again.

[DeLorean]

Kenny seemed more confident in the press conference on Monday and in his interview after the Serbia game. More bullish and less overawed by the whole experience.

I felt the press conference and the pre/post match interviews last night were polar opposites to be honest - he doesn't do bullish defiance well at all, just looks like a guy under enormous pressure. He was far more composed and rational last night I felt, unflustered.

Happy to give him the campaign at least. It was always gonna take a long time. My biggest fear beforehand was that the job itself (rather than the project) would be too big for him, out of his depth personality wise. I haven't seen much to alleviate that concern, it's only heightened overall tbh.

But the big positive is that we're seeing young players grow, if not necessarily the team itself or the brand of football, to the extent we would have hoped.

So even if he ultimately flops results wise, at least he'll have done a lot of the ground work for the next guy. And, as has been well documented, there isn't really any obviously desirable candidate to take over currently anyway - so let's hope he can break his competitive duck in Baku and take it from there.

[Stuttgart88]

It certainly seems that there is a heck of a lot of support for Kenny, his project and this group of players. Great to see.

I was thinking the same last night. It was really evident that there's a real love for this team and I think also full support for the difficult project at hand.

[paul_oshea]

So we're happy to quote ybig now oh the irony....

[Stuttgart88]

I desperately wanted Kenny to succeed for a number of reasons, the main one being his man management skills and ability to make players believe they were on a same level as better players. However in a short time he has made us approach matches as though we are Andora or Malta. We played Serbia today, a half decent international team who we traditionally would like to think we are slightly better than. Today we made then look like Brazil and approached the game like we were playing Brazil. Enough is enough

I thought Serbia looked class because they are quite classy. Big, athletic, technically sound, cohesive, star quality upfront. Really good team. What we should aspire to being like.

[kennedmc]

These two posts just demonstrate the lack of sincerity and decency from a lot of posters on here over the last couple of years.

Anyone with a bit of objectivity would realize that today’s result was a very positive result. The performance was also very, very good at times. The passing and composure in the second half was, at times, excellent. Of course there were some mistakes too but that 45 mins was a nett positive from all aspects.

Why was the result so positive? 5 of the Serbian team have won international tournaments at u19 and u20 level (Mitrovic just won the u19 euros), incl the u20 World Cup. Their team has a number of winners of Europa league etc in the team and players being selected on the team of the tournament. Their 2 most inexperienced players at club level (Pavlovic and Vlahovic) have more club appearances than Bazunu, Omobamidele, McGrath and Idah combined. Vlahovic is 21 with 28 goals for Fiorentina by the way.

We can’t hold anything in our squad up as a reasonable comparison.

To try and play down the quality and strength of Serbia and the achievement to get a draw is indicative of the unreasonableness of many on here. All of which ultimately makes the atmosphere here way more polarized than it has to be.

Agree with your point re Serbia - they look a really good side in the making and if they could finish properly they'd have been 3 up no bother.

I don't agree with your summation that our performance was "....very very good at times".

I felt we struggled alot especially once we were in there half with the ball. There keeper had nothing to do until 85 minute apart from Hendrick back pass as far as I recall

I'm glad we started playing it a bit longer at times as I think it is important to mix it up, if short ball is on great, if not look for a longer option. Sensible.