Ireland euro squad predictions (3 Viewers)

[washingcattle]

And again so what if he takes up good positions and beats players. If the support isn't there then he should have held the ball up. He's a bird brain he runs down as many blind alleys a Hunt actually. I'm glad you brought this up as this is my other problem with him.


I'll prepare a full dossier next time I see him. Thanks Fintan. You've given a purpose to my hatred (not hatred actually just seething contempt)


P.S as with all Irish players I would dearly love to be proved wrong. I mean in January when we signed Gibson I came out with the reasoned response "Sack Moyes" I was wrong I admit it. For the record, I'd love McGeady to prove me wrong.

 

[Jerry Twig]

3.30 today

 

[Jerry Twig]

So my predicted 23:

Given
Westwood
Forde

Ward
St. Ledger
Dunne
O'Shea
O'Dea
Kelly
Foley

Whelan
Andrews
Gibson
Fahey
McGeady
Duff
McClean
Hunt

Keane
Doyle
Walters
Cox
Long

Let's see how it matches up in 4 hours

 

[Jerry Twig]

Adding of course that it won't be 100% as there's still the mystery pull-out for 'personal reasons'. I'm not taking a punt on who that is

 

[Richie]

Strong rumours from several places that Duffer is the one not going

This site seems to think it has the full squad:
http://www.european-championship.co...eft-out-of-Rep-of-Ireland-squad-201205070003/

edit - that site is bullshit apparently.. wait for the announcement, I suppose.

 

[Luther Blissett]

Here's the squad from the FAI's Twitter account:

Given, Westwood, Forde, Dunne, O'Shea, St.Ledger, O'Dea, Ward, Kelly, Foley, Whelan, Gibson, Andrews, Fahey, Duff, McGeady, Hunt, McClean, Keane, Doyle, Cox, Long, Walters. STANDBY: Randolph, McShane, Green, Coleman, Keogh

There's no room for James McCarthy (who seems to be the player missing out for personal reasons), but McClean's on the plane. Who knows where the Duff rumours came from?

 

[Jerry Twig]

So my predicted 23:

Given
Westwood
Forde

Ward
St. Ledger
Dunne
O'Shea
O'Dea
Kelly
Foley

Whelan
Andrews
Gibson
Fahey
McGeady
Duff
McClean
Hunt

Keane
Doyle
Walters
Cox
Long

Let's see how it matches up in 4 hours

100% !!

 

[Luther Blissett]

McCarthy's announced that his father has cancer so he's decided to pull out of the squad. Sad news for him, but hopefully he'll have other chances to play in a major tournament.

 

[Richie]

That's a shame about McCarthy, particularly given how well he's been playing lately.. He'll get other chances in the future I'm sure. Hope his da pulls through. Besides that I think it's the squad we more or less expected, or hoped for. Fringe players like Hoolahan or Clark aside, I think Trap has made the right calls between the ones who were realistically going to be in contention. Would have liked to see Wilson in there but it wasn't going to happen given his prolonged absence. Fingers crossed they all get through another week of league games now.

 

[Luther Blissett]

100% !!

Fair play. On the ball as always! Apart from Wilson for Foley that's the squad I would have chosen given that McCarthy has pulled out.

My starting XI would be:

Given
Kelly Dunne St Ledger O'Shea
Duff Andrews Gibson McClean
Long Keane

But it's more than likely going to be Ward for Kelly, Whelan instead of Gibson, McGeady for McClean and Doyle up front alongside Keane. Either way McClean could turn out to be a great impact sub.

 

[Luther Blissett]

That's a shame about McCarthy, particularly given how well he's been playing lately.. He'll get other chances in the future I'm sure. Hope his da pulls through. Besides that I think it's the squad we more or less expected, or hoped for. Fringe players like Hoolahan or Clark aside, I think Trap has made the right calls between the ones who were realistically going to be in contention. Would have liked to see Wilson in there but it wasn't going to happen given his prolonged absence. Fingers crossed they all get through another week of league games now.

Agreed. Hopefully Hoolahan will feature in the WC qualifiers and Clark is another for the future who's been unlucky with injury. I'm a bit surprised he wasn't included on the standby list though as, despite his inexperience, he can cover defensive midfield, centre-back and fullback.

 

[washingcattle]

Given
Kelly Dunne St Ledger O'Shea
Duff Whelan Gibson McClean
Keane
Walters

 

[Jerry Twig]

Fair play. On the ball as always! Apart from Wilson for Foley that's the squad I would have chosen given that McCarthy has pulled out.

My starting XI would be:

Given
Kelly Dunne St Ledger O'Shea
Duff Andrews Gibson McClean
Long Keane

But it's more than likely going to be Ward for Kelly, Whelan instead of Gibson, McGeady for McClean and Doyle up front alongside Keane. Either way McClean could turn out to be a great impact sub.

Cheers Luther!
Very happy with the squad, although the back-up five looks threadbare. Would have liked to have seen Wilson and Clarke in there at least.
I'd say your rewritten team is right to start, except I actually think Walters will get the nod ahead of Doyle, and rightfully so. Ward would obviously play on the left and O'Shea on the right (Kelly is a right back). I'd also be happier to see McGeady and Duff start, and McClean feature as a late sub for Duff, with McGeady then switching to the right. I really don't see McClean getting more than that.

 

[washingcattle]

24 hours after being named in the Irish squad McClean is getting death threats and dogs abuse from Norn Iron idiots.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-17987182

Still I liked his response

"Love the dogs' abuse am gettin off shock N.I fans, just worry about watchin ur own country at the euros... oh wait #mybad #awkward haha."

No wonder no one wants to play for them. They're shite and their fans are cunts. Are there any northern Irish internationals that would make it into our squad now ?

Any young lads? I.e who should we "nick" next

 

[Luther Blissett]

From Sid Lowe on Twitter: 'Puyol out for six weeks (knee). Will miss Copa del Rey final and probably the EuroCopa. '

Excuse the schadenfreude, but that means Ramos will probably be moved to centre-back which can only be good news for Ireland when we play Spain.[FONT=arial, sans-serif][/FONT]

 

[Unicron]

From Sid Lowe on Twitter: 'Puyol out for six weeks (knee). Will miss Copa del Rey final and probably the EuroCopa. '

Excuse the schadenfreude, but that means Ramos will probably be moved to centre-back which can only be good news for Ireland when we play Spain.[FONT=arial, sans-serif][/FONT]

Villa (no surprise) will miss it too. My foolish hopes of getting something out of a physically drained Spanish team are heightened.

Of course, take the Barca and possibly also the Real players out of the Spain side you'd probably still have a team capable of winning the thing.

 

[washingcattle]

From Sid Lowe on Twitter: 'Puyol out for six weeks (knee). Will miss Copa del Rey final and probably the EuroCopa. '

Excuse the schadenfreude, but that means Ramos will probably be moved to centre-back which can only be good news for Ireland when we play Spain.[FONT=arial, sans-serif][/FONT]

Ramos is better at centre half then he is at full back. He gets lost much less. Kinda like John O Shea when he was allowed to get forward. Puyol looks older, slower and more of a liability with every game I see him in. I don't see this as particularly good news at all.

By no means saying Ramos is a good player now.

 

[Richie]

Maybe if about 10 more of them withdraw I'll start feeling slightly more confident about that fixture.. The one thing in our favour might be the sheer number of games that the Real and Barca players have had to play and the length of their season. The Copa del Rey final between Barca and Athletic Bilbao is only 2 weeks before Spain's first game at the Euros, which is crazy really.

 

[washingcattle]

If only our first game was against either Italy or Spain we'd have a great chance as both are notorious slow starters.

 

[Hector Grey]

Villa (no surprise) will miss it too. My foolish hopes of getting something out of a physically drained Spanish team are heightened.

Of course, take the Barca and possibly also the Real players out of the Spain side you'd probably still have a team capable of winning the thing.

After their respective seasons, and with the added ennui of the serial achievers thrown in, Spain would be a better team if they were all non Real/Barca players. Llorente and Soldado up front? Mata and Silva on the wings? Martinez and Garcia in the middle. Etcetera.