Ireland vs Macedonia (2 Viewers)

[Moods For Mallards]

The System is horrible. Duff was attacking down the right at one point in the second half and Foley moved to support him. Trap was going nuts telling him to stay. Bascially, full backs are not allowed to support the wide players. It's horrible. It means that every time Duff or McGeady gets the ball, it's a 1 on 2 or 3 micro-game, rest of team not involved becasue the central midfield players don't offer themselves as outlets either.

Important 3 points, right in contention, etc.

 

[SomethingManic]

Dismal. I wouldn't mind beating Macedonia by one goal if we actually played some good football, or played with some motivation but we just don't! Trap has made us boring and predictable. Players have no motivation whatsoever. 3 points is nice, but I dunno how long Trap's luck will last.

 

[coast to coast]

Dismal. I wouldn't mind beating Macedonia by one goal if we actually played some good football, or played with some motivation but we just don't! Trap has made us boring and predictable. Players have no motivation whatsoever. 3 points is nice, but I dunno how long Trap's luck will last.

The point of the Irish team isn't to entertain you. We're not spectators, we're supporters.

And its not about playing "good football" which is of course, never in anyway detailed. Its about results, good results are good football. Trap has made us boring, predictable and hugely effective, really difficult to break down, and highly highly motivated and determined to get the points. Have we had a single uncommitted performance in his reign? Its not luck, he knows exactly what he's doing and why he's doing it. He may be mad, but its riven with method.

And whats with this whole they're-only-Macedonia argument? Why does everyone assume any international team other than the real real minnows (the microstates) is going to be easy to beat?

 

[Cormcolash]

Well let's face the facts here: We won last night because Macedonia have a shit goalkeeper.
Apart from that, we rarely posed a thread to them, and only a great save from Westwood stopped them bringing it back to 2-2. At home.
That's the fucking fact there; we were very close to letting a team we went 2-0 up against come back and level it. That's not effective, it's fucking suicidal. Ireland played suicide football last night, like they always seem to do when they manage to get in front - because Trappitoni's system wants players to defend when they get ahead, the result is that the players don't press the ball in the right area of the pitch, i.e the opposition's half. The reason Macedonia scored at all is because we let them come in and play football in our half of the pitch, with the midfielders in particular always backing off and getting deeper and deeper towards the edge of their own box, and this is the way Trappitoni wants it. It's fucking suicide, and it is only a matter of time before we are found out. I wouldn't be surprised if we struggle at home against Armenia and away against Andorra if we continue to play that way, not to mention the next match against Macedonia in Skopje in the middle of June and 30 degree heat. Maybe if we wear some orange shirts that one will turn out okay...

What we should be doing instead is letting the midfielders compete for the ball in the middle of the pitch, rather than always having them inviting the opposition forward. And the full-backs have to support the wingers, or they end up isolated and give the ball away - a lot of our good chances last night came from full-backs giving that support and a winger managing to get a cross in. Foley had a good game actuallly, fair play to him.

What was noticeable last night was that we did manage to kill the game in the last 10 minutes or so, mainly because the midfield after Fahey came on for Gibson was able to go forward and compete for the ball - all of a sudden, Whelan was winning headers inside Macedonia's half, and we were getting much more comfortable possession.

The other problem with Trappitoni is his blind loyalty to certain players. It's a fair argument that Whelan has turned into a capable defensive midfielder, and Kilbane may have been the best choice for left-back just for the experience and height, but why the fuck Gibson ever gets a match ahead of the likes of Fahey and McCarthy is a fucking mystery. Gibson is fucking shit - Mr.fucking Anonymous. As soon as Fahey came on for him last night, we looked a better team straight away. Let Gibson warm the fucking bench until he moves away from Man.Ure and tries to actually play first-team football for someone.

Good points from last night - O'Dea and Foley looked solid; the defence had a fairly good game actually, their main problems were caused by complete lack of competitiveness in midfield in my opinion.
Also, Duff and McGeady were good, and Long put in a good shift too. Keane was his usual self - not up to much, but fuck it, he scores goals.

Duff had a great game and deservedly got man of the match, and I thought McGeady was very good as well, holding on to the ball as much as he could despite the complete absence of Kilbane anywhere near him. Some of McGeady's touches were lovely last night.

Finally, the referee was fucking shit again - no balls at all, he was completely unwilling to give a telling decision to either team. And that Macedonian defender DEFINITELY should have seen a straight red for that kung-fu kick on Long, fucking horrendous challenge!

 

[Unicron]

And that Macedonian defender DEFINITELY should have seen a straight red for that kung-fu kick on Long, fucking horrendous challenge!

After the match Long apparently claimed that the defender told him before hand, in the first half presumably, that he was going to do him.

The System is horrible. Duff was attacking down the right at one point in the second half and Foley moved to support him. Trap was going nuts telling him to stay. Bascially, full backs are not allowed to support the wide players. It's horrible. It means that every time Duff or McGeady gets the ball, it's a 1 on 2 or 3 micro-game, rest of team not involved becasue the central midfield players don't offer themselves as outlets either.

Funny thing about that is Daniel McDonnell from the Indo said on Off The Ball this week that at a presser Trap said the full backs don't get forward as much as he'd like and that he does give them licence to get forward.

Anyway, good result, still in with a shot of being boring and shit in Ukraine/Poland. The most important thing though was that there wasn't the guy wearing the #2 jersey at centre half. He was at right back just as god intended.

The Uruguay game could be interesting now with Doyle injured (that's Wolves probably relegated so) and Keane released back to West Ham. If Trap does see McCarthy as a "10" then let him play there and stick Long (who still looks nothing better than a game lad to me no matter how well people say he'd doing for Reading in the championship) up front on his own.

 

[Jerry Twig]

Jesus, a lot of whinging in here.
3 points, Russia dropped 2, and McCarthy is nailed down. I'd have taken that in a shot beforehand.
Putting things in relative perspective: the new guns all showed good poise and ability against a team that are no turkeys, especially O'Dea; we put the usual panic on in the second half, but actually took the game by the scruff in the last 15 minutes and we NEVER do that, so I was very happy with that. McGeady and Duff on the wings is a class act. Gibson/Whelan is a total no-go, and it's the critical flaw that everyone knows and on which everything hinges, but now we have McCarthy to put that right, and U are Gay is perfect timing for him to boss the midfield.
Obviously missing Dunne will be a killer in Skopje mind.
This thing about the goalkeeper being shit as the only reason we won, I don't agree with. We went 2 up and did an Ireland. I think if we went into the last 30 at 0-0 we would have had the guns to get decent shots in and score against a decent keeper. You can't know these things. Mind you, I didn't see much in Long at all despite making himself available. He seemed weak.

 

[Moods For Mallards]

The negativity is justified. We were't "hugely effective" last night. The plan failed. They have several chances, one or two excellent ones, to equalise. This, in my opinion, was due to our inviting them back into the game when we almost had it won. Inviting them onto a weak, defence lacking confidence and understanding at that.
We're definitely in contention, but I can't see us winning the games we need to win unless there's a change of some sort from the manager, in terms of the contribution the midfield and full-back players are expected to make.

Unicron, I didn't hear that press conference but I'd take it with a pinch of salt if Trap said that. It's evidently not the way he wants his full backs to play.

 

[Unicron]

Unicron, I didn't hear that press conference but I'd take it with a pinch of salt if Trap said that. It's evidently not the way he wants his full backs to play.

I'm not disagreeing with you, just relaying what Trap is claiming. I think the issue with the full backs not coming forward is exacerbated by the fact that we play with inverted wingers these days. Duff and McGeady are both naturally likely to look to come inside which narrows the team quite a bit, but also creates space that you would expect the full backs to move into.

 

[rettucs]

Well let's face the facts here: We won last night because Macedonia have a shit goalkeeper.
Apart from that, we rarely posed a thread to them, and only a great save from Westwood stopped them bringing it back to 2-2. At home.

yes, thats how things panned out. But theres nothing to say Ireland wouldn't have gone on and scored a couple more goals had the keeper not made of the balls he did. Ireland sat back after goal 2. They became a little more conservative and eased off (as tends to happen - human nature and all that).

So you can't just say if they hadn't a shitty keeper they'd have won. It'd have been a totally different game. They might have won, but I doubt they would have. When you don't feel any great urgency to go looking for goals the whole team dynamic changes.

So thats another dunphy comment I'd have to argue down. Thing is, Irelands' backs were to the wall and they coped fairly well. I reckon people are focussing too much on the negative. Yes there was plenty of it, but plenty decent too.

 

[rettucs]

Fair enough, but their remit is a little greater than 'Can we beat Macedonia?'
They're looking at the larger picture of whether we're good enough to qualify.

right, but the only true measure of how they'll fare against the better teams is when they play the bigger teams. You always raise (or drop) your standards depending on the opposition. Its the hardest thing in the world to do to play your absolute best against some shit team and utterly steamroll them. It'll happen from time to time but I reckon most games where one team hockeys the shit out of another, the team that wins play a good bit within themselves.

When is the last time Ireland hockeyed anyone? The only time I can recall Ireland hammering anyone was against Turkey in 1990 (I think - the day aldridge got the hattrick). I remember the game pretty well. Ireland didn't play that well. Yes, Turkey were shite, but Ireland playing poorly were still good enough to hockey them.

I forget what my point was.

Yes, the punditry was very entertainment. Them rounding on Bill over his complaining about the size of the crowd, or Brady telling Dunphy that we're not allowed play 15 players. Gold.

 

[rettucs]

by the way, that shite I'm spouting holds for every sport. My 'expertise' is in another (team) code, and it definitely holds true for that.

 

[Richie]

I don't remember the last time we comfortably beat somebody that was above the level of San Marino or Andorra, you'd probably have to go back to the qualifiers for the 2002 WC, we always struggle to put these mid-tier Eastern European sides away.

I thought it was a reasonable performance from Ireland last night, I'm sort of astounded at the amount of negativity towards the team I've come across on various forums since the game. As ever we're lacking the one or two good centre midfielders who can demand the ball and dictate play and I think this is why we always fail to build on leads and allow the other team back into the game but the other areas of the team were quite effective. The new lads did well, Westwood looks a very assured keeper and O'Dea was solid enough. McGeady had probably his best game for us. After the scare with Westwood's save I was impressed that we closed out the last 10 minutes quite professionally by keeping the ball instead of the usual punt-it-anywhere under siege stuff.

A couple of months down the line hopefully we'll have McCarthy & David Meyler contending for the 2 centre mid spots which will give us better options there. I'd try an experiment with 4-4-1-1 for the Uruguay game, play Fahey & Lawrence in the middle with McGeady & Treacy on the wings, McCarthy 'in the hole' and Long or Walters up front seeing as we'll be missing Keane & Doyle.

 

[Moods For Mallards]

Scutter, we've already been taken apart by Russia. We're in a situation where I think we need to approach the game differently if we're to pick up the necessary points from here 'til the end of the group. This is if we have designs on winning the group, which I thought we did at the outset.

It's a general rule of thumb that Ireland are more impressive against better teams but you can only take that so far.

 

[Jerry Twig]

I'd try an experiment with 4-4-1-1 for the Uruguay game, play Fahey & Lawrence in the middle with McGeady & Treacy on the wings, McCarthy 'in the hole' and Long or Walters up front seeing as we'll be missing Keane & Doyle.

Why play Lawrence in the middle when he'll never in a million years actually start there in a competitive game? Trap will always anchor one possible CM to one probable in a friendly.

 

[Moods For Mallards]

People are talking about central midfielders contending for places but unfortunately the manager is not guaranteed to pick the best performing midfield players or allow them to play in a positive way. Russia exposed us so badly there.

I'm being quite negative here. Positives for me:
- Westwood was very solid
- McGeady was excellent in the main, delivered end product, played confidently, always available as an out ball, etc.
- Duff and all of the forward players made positive contributions
- Foley was generally good
- In the last 15 minutes, we played with compsure and closed out the game well after it had got to a dire situation.

 

[1 2 3 GO]

Did we win?

 

[Unicron]

Re: 4411. Trap did a prerecorded interview for RTE that the put on in the preview last night that I watched this afternoon. He said if you're playing with a lone striker you need at least one winger who can score goals. He obviously feels that we don't have that and Duff* contributing the odd screamer for Fulham aside the goal against Wales was his first in international football in years and McGeady, yes it was a good hit last night but it was his first for us and his club record is 1 in every 5 or 6 league games, I wouldn't disagree with his assessment of our goal threat from the flanks and if that's his requirement for us to play that way then I can't blame him.

So if we're going to be more progressive I think it's obviously going to be within the confines of a 442 and perhaps the way to do that would be for him to give a bit more scope to get forward to one of the midfielders, and to be honest I think Trap hasn't really rated his options in the past in terms of midfeilders who can get forward and again, I'm not sure I can blame him when we're talking about Darron Gibson who I don't think convinces anyone at this stage or Andy fucking Reid, and I think it was wrong to freeze him out of the squad but it's utter desperation to consider him to be a genuine option in centre midfield, has a club manager played him there at all in recent seasons unless it was part of a 3 like at Blackpool? So rather than playing someone he hasn't got faith in he's mostly picked two holding players who should at least make us solid instead of sacrificing that for someone who can't do either job well. Maybe McCarthy could be that player we'll see. I hope he starts on against Uruguay anyway.

* The other winger at Fulham is generally Simon Davies who isn't much of a goal threat either and they noramlly play with one up top but the player they put in the hole is usually someone who can score goals rather than being a creator in Gera or Dempsey.

 

[washingcattle]

People are talking about central midfielders contending for places but unfortunately the manager is not guaranteed to pick the best performing midfield players or allow them to play in a positive way. Russia exposed us so badly there.

I'm being quite negative here. Positives for me:
- Westwood was very solid
- McGeady was excellent in the main, delivered end product, played confidently, always available as an out ball, etc.
- Duff and all of the forward players made positive contributions
- Foley was generally good
- In the last 15 minutes, we played with compsure and closed out the game well after it had got to a dire situation.

In the last 15 minutes we had a lad in the middle of the park that could actually pass a ball forward and to an irish player.

I thought McGeady was alright but he still hit the first man with most of his crosses and after he cut inside the first time the Macs put two lads on him for the rest of the match.

The system was all wrong but no system changes the fact that we couldn't hold onto the ball for more than two or three passes.

Fahey and McCarthy have to start the next match I'd nearly go 5 across midfield with Whelan in front of the back four since that's where he plays anyway and we'll be without Doyle for probably a fair while. On the plus side the defence (except for Dunnes error) looked like they had a reasonable understanding with each other. Kilbane was the right decision afterall. There are positives, we won the match, we finished with a reasonable approximation of a midfield, Keane got a goal which is important for any striker returning from injury.

Plus The Russian result cancels out any advantage they had and makes our result in Armenia look much better. Basically if we can beat Slovakia at home and Macedonia away we'll go to Russia knowing that a win may be enough to win the group outright and a draw may be enough to scupper them as they look like they have a few slip ups left in them. That's huge considering how fucked we were after the Russian match at home.

By the way has anyone any idea what happened t Kieth Andrews ? He was great against France in Paris and then his groin has been fucked ever since ? Has he played this season ?

 

[Unicron]

By the way has anyone any idea what happened t Kieth Andrews ? He was great against France in Paris and then his groin has been fucked ever since ? Has he played this season ?

He's played 2 games this season. A guy I know who, for his sins regularly goes to Ewood Park described one of them as the worst performance he's ever seen anyone ever put in for Blackburn.

 

[washingcattle]

Good to know.