Ireland V Austria

there's not one of those irish players i would have at anfield..very poor.

 

Not a great game but four points against Austria is a serious haul. Alaba on a different planet to every other player on the pitch.

The goal disallowed near the end looked very dubious

 

A draw is a fine result in the overall scheme of things.

If you'd asked me before the start of this campaign where I thought we'd be at this stage, I'd have suggested we'd have a few points less, so I'm happy so far (although granted, I'd have loved the win at home to Austria).

 

A lot of people on social media giving out about the disallowed goal. Personally I don't think it should have been disallowed but we didn't deserve any more than a point from that game anyway.
We're in a very good position and 4 points against Austria is a great return

 

In real time I expected the goal to be disallowed before it was. Dunphy talks a lot of bollocks but I fully agree with him that O'Neill got the team selection wrong. He is inherently too cautious. Austria were there for the taking when the right Irish players were on the pitch. He went a long way to throwing away two points, two points which could be crucial in the shake up.

 

Referee and his assistants were very poor the whole game, goal should have stood. Its still in our own hands so roll on September and the home game to Serbia.

 

.....and water is wet.

I'll use the same phrase I used for the VVD Fiasco.

Believing that Ireland would play some football is like falling for a plot twist in a book you've already read.

The sooner MON is gone the better.

 

I watch a lot of football and I also referee a lot of football and I know of no other team any were in the world at any level that kicks the ball as long and as high as we do. Our football makes tony pulis look sophisticated. In seen about 3 minutes of Germany v San Marino and even the latter were playing it out from the back.

 

Irish football followers (use that term loosely) consistently make me laugh. Joint top of a tough enough group with two tough away games played and all you hear is moan, moan, moan. Too many people are influenced by the pundits. Same people will be out in force if we get to Russia next year with their Leprechaun hats and Morph suits pretending to be the best fans in the world.

If you look at the quality of the current Irish squad, probably Coleman, Brady and at a push Hendrick and Long would go for north of 10 million, even by today's massively inflated transfer fees. It's not O'Neills fault that we have a lot of the lower rung Premiership players and a host of championship players making up the squad. Wes Hoolahan is a lovely footballer, however he has played two Premier League campaigns in his whole career and only reached the 40 cap mark last night. Dunphy talks about him as if he is some 30 year old playmaker that has been in the Premier League for 10 years racking up 20 assists every season. McGeady again has been forced to go down to the Championship to get regular game time and never cut it at top level. Not sure who O Neill is leaving out that could come in and transform the team into a cohesive attacking unit.

For me in this and the last campaign, O'Neill has got the best out of limited Premier League players like McClean, Long and Walters. He plays to their strengths as they are the best attacking players. Neat one-twos with Wessi are not their strengths game in game out. Over the top or counter attacking are what those players thrive on. Either on the break from a long ball or a set piece is our best chance of scoring. If you try to play continental teams like in the first half yesterday in competitive games, the squads limitations are there for everyone to see. Alaba was just on a different planet.

Ward, Whelan, Walters, McClean are not those type of players and in second half he brought on Murphy and it changed the game. We looks far more dangerous with long punts.

Could see people getting on O Neill's back if he bought a lot of the Irish players over the course of a couple of transfer and played this way, however his job is to get the team to Russia and the tactics so far are doing the job with the players available.Long may it continue.

 

Just because we disagree with O'Neill's lineup, and I did before, during and after the game, and still do now, does not mean I am influenced by pundits. Glenn Whelan has 81 caps, you will say that is a sign of where we are but no, there are other options and he should not have been playing ahead of them at home to an out of sorts Austrian side who rightly looked shit when we actually bothered to have a go at them in the second half. O'Neill got it wrong, the way the game changed when he set up more aggressively showed that. And no, I won't be going to Russia.

 

I watched them against Uruguay and they were excellent played great football, even working a lovely press on the opposition. Same team against a limited Austria and we let them piss all over us because the manager is on the touchline jumping up and down and waving his hands at the players in a "just fcuking lump it" gesture. We're lucky to be where we are. We only got something out of that game due to a hopefully long ball. We tried what must have been 50 or 60 of them and only 1, just 1 came off and it was lucky it did(an error from a defender that let Walters in) and then Walters had to produce an unbelievable finish on the volley. 9 times out of 10 a player will miss that chance.

There's no reason we can't knock the ball around. I've played, watched, coached and reffed enough football games in my time to know that we can produce better. MON has made a carrier out of being a long ball junkie, so he'll never change. @GaryMc If we don't qualify for Russia would you hold the same review of his tactics?

Harry Arter is a fine fine footballer and he's capable of so much more, same goes for a lot of the lads. All I'm saying is at least try play some football for the first 60-70 mins at least, and then you can start lumping it if you really want to.

 

Compare our players to N Ireland or Scotland and we are as good, even Wales have championship level defenders. None of them play anything like we do and Northern Ireland have 2 tony pulis centre backs in the side.

We are literally the only side that thump it, we don't even thump it towards a winger, we try put snow on it and hope the centre backs shit themselves. Its stone age stuff, fair enough against Germany or Spain but Austria are shit.

 

I thought in the first half the players tried to keep the ball on the deck a lot more and tried to play more than they usually do in competitive games. This worked against a disinterested Uruguay team in a meaningless friendly, however different story when facing a team with a Bayern Munich player who need to win to get their campaign back on Track.

Thought Arter looked nervous, himself and Brady in particular were playing a lot of balls in around the Austrians feet and it was leading to fast counter attacks by the Austrians as they were intercepting a lot of loose play in midfield. Ward in particular looked to have been instructed to play to Brady and Arter's feet and it didn't work. Austria had a stream of corners in a row that came from fast breaks and scored from one.

Second half Ireland played more to the key players strengths with more long balls over the top.

Looked far more dangerous and this time around we seems to have a glut of corners.

We should have won the game bar the dodgy decision and would be sitting pretty at the top of the group.

In terms of people listening to Pundits, I am more referring to the constant clamour for players like Wes and Before him Andy Reid who really are decent looking players, however never came near to cutting it at top level. Probably explains why Glen Whelan has more caps than both. He has played in Premier League for as long as I can remember when some of the others people would love to see in the Irish team have been warming the bench for the teams going between the championship and premier league.

 

I agree with the point about players like Holohan and Reid,these lads turn into great players on the basis of not being picked when they're bang average but O'Neill's tactics play into that,people cry out for anything to excite them.The look at the players we have,its either this type of football or we lose argument is not something I agree with. When you're employing tactics like that it can very quickly become submissive and I don't think any football supporter should have to accept that when the level of the opposition is generally at a standard we should be capable of going toe to toe with. Save the caution for the away games and send the team out and home at least knowing you have belief in them to out play the other side.I'd love to know what Roy Keane would say as a pundit about this set up.

 

I'd say he would be concerned with being competitive and in with a chance of qualifying rather than how nice the football is to be honest.

In last 30 years Ireland have qualified for Euro 88, Italia 90, USA 94, WC 02, Euro 2012 and Euro 2016

In all bar 2002, I would say it's been tactics that are not for the purist that got us there. McCarthy, Kerr and to some extent Stan had a better crop of players to pick from. The two Keanes at their peak, Given, Duff, Dunne are all better than the current squad, however missed out time on a lot of tournaments. Played some nicely football along the way though.

 

Your first sentence there mate,why does it have to be one or the other? O'Neill is in the Pulis bracket,he has the people in his corner convinced that what he's serving up is the best we can expect and we should be grateful for it. Between O'Neill and Trappatoni (who both qualified for tournaments)they've made watching Ireland a chore for those who have more expectations than slogging our way to a tournament that lasts 2 weeks.Jack Charltons tactics is often thrown into this debate because that's when international football in this country was at its most popular (in the modern era anyway)but for me that's a red herring.It was direct under Charlton but it wasn't boring and it was never submissive.We constantly took the game to teams of all levels and never would have given a team like that Austria team that kind of respect.It doesn't have to be poetry,a bit of bollocks will do.

 

Funny you should mention Pulis. Three of our certain starters made their name under him in the league (Whelan, McClean, Walters) under him. I would say that unless they played in a Pulis like team, they would be in the Championship. Bit unfair on Walters maybe, however these lads have had successful careers playing 'effective' football.

I love good football, would like nothing better than to see Wes Hoolahan, Harry Arter and Robbie Brady playing lovely passing however don't think we would be top of the group playing that way with current squad. Not saying it's impossible for someone like Chris Hughton to come in and play a good brand of football and be competitive. Again though Martin O Neill has a much better CV than him in the game. The FAI are not going to pay top dollar for a manager unless they get an outside backer like for Trapp.

People complain about Trapp however I would rather be boring to watch and qualify for tournaments than nice to watch and sit and watch the tournaments at home. He was literally robbed of chance of World Cup in 2010. I can why people with a passing interest in international football can be turned off by boring tactics however I'd be more interested in results myself.

Even before O'Neill became manager of Ireland, I sensed an irrational dislike among Liverpool supporters and O Neill. Think it goes back to him beating LFC in 2003. I never wanted him to ever be LFC manager however every time he was even mentioned there was a slew of negativity. If you look at his record at Leicester, Celtic, Villa and Sunderland he over achieved at each club. His football with all those clubs was not pretty but I bet a few seasons later, each club would have taken him back. Sunderland and Villa were top half teams under him, Celtic in European Final and Leicester went into steady decline and League 1 after he left

 

You don't think people with more than a passing interest in international football will be turned off by boring football? And you don't think that team could have more of a go than we do and at least match the results?