Given, O'Shea, McShane, Dunne, Kelly, Ireland, Carsley, Kilbane, McGeady, Doyle, Keane. Don't like it. Reid should have started. But at least we have options from the bench.
Starting lineup (GK)Given (RB)O'Shea (LB)Kelly (CB)Dunne (CB)McShane (RM)McGeady (CM)Carsley (CM)Ireland (LM)Kilbane (F)Keane (F)Doyle That's as given by RTÉ, can't see Kelly and O'Shea playing opposite to how they do for their clubs so Kelly for the right I reckon. No defenders on the bench
Slovakia: Senecky, Gresko, Cech, Durica, Klimpl, Krajcik, Hamsik, Sapara, Mintal, Holosko, Sestak. Subs: Kuciak, Petras, Brezinsky, Strba, Obzera, Hodur, Sebo
1-0 7mins, Ireland for Ireland...Kilbane cross, dummy by Keane, Ireland scoring over keeper from close range
1-1 Half Time. Really poor stuff by Ireland - all elementary mistakes, the lads just don't seem interested. Slovakia are an awful side but I think we're going to lose this match.
Doyle's goal reminded me of Houghton's quite a bit, I doubt he would've saved it regardless but he was way off his line (much like the Italian keeper against Houghton), again, I doubt he could've gotten to it anyway. http://www.attachmax.com/Doyle_vs_Slovakia.html
Was both proud and surprised to see Darron Gibson come on. Im convinced eamon dunphy is anti irish. He jumped all over stan in his analysis. Ive never seen him be supportive of a manager.
Why Darron Gibson too, he plays in the reserves and aside from playing against a very poor Denmark side has never really played for Ireland either, you can move Kilbane or O'Shea and bring in Hunt or Reid on the wing. Anyway, all I could think about was the Israel game after full time (not the one with Awat being a ********)
Hunt not featuring was criminal. Positively criminal. Its the type of decision that makes you question whether Stauton actually watches football on a weekly basis or whether he simply shows up on international breaks. I mean honestly, Gibson and Douglas before Hunt? Are you familiar with the Premiership and what it takes to be a starting midfielder on a midtable club there? A ********ing joke, sack the man now.
I thought Gibson actually did quite well, though. Functional, anyway. Douglas was at fault for the goal, failed to track the left back's run. He looked completely lost at right of midfield. Yeah, I felt exactly the same after that goal went in as I did after the Tel Aviv match. As if I had been punched in the stomach.
obvisouly unhappy with the draw, but none the less they played really well except mcgeady, what was wrong with him? and doyle in the first half (second half he was great). did anyone notice that the commentators on rte kept referring to the slovakia defenders as the czech defense. that confused me.
Honestly, I had to leave for my own training at half time so I didn't see much of Gibson (I fastfowarded through the recorded stream), which is why I didn't comment on his play today. I just can't figure out why a guy who hasn't even played in a Cup match would be on in such a vital time. EDIT: Sorry, he played 15 minutes against Barnet last year in the League Cup
At any level mentality is one quarter of the game, at an international level it weighs even more. So with support like this, we don’t need rival fans; we beat ourselves before the game begins
fans should'nt be beating the team it should be the opposition,and i for one agree the sooner its over the better. this side under stan is appalling in pretty much every aspet of the game.if this was the best we could do,i'd say something positive. but with this squad of half decent premiership players a proper manager would easily be able to get much more solid and convincing performance out of the bunch. or so you would hope.....
I was OK with Staunton being appointed as I did not think we had the players to qualify for the Euros and we might as well just let Stan be in charge while we're just blooding new young players. As it turns out, we really could have qualified to Euro 2008 if we had a proper manager. Stauntons selection and tactics make no sense to me. We never had any grip of that game against a poor Slovakian team. Why the hell wasn't Andy Reid in the middle, getting hold of the ball and getting some passing going? What the hell are we doing with Kelly at LB? If you're going to play Kilbane then play him at LB. I hope Gibson has a great future, but was it really right to throw a 19 year old who is in United reserves into a situation where we need to close down a vital game?