Cult of Stephen Kenny

sonofenoch

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119164771#Comment_119164771

Yeah I quite enjoy watching this Ireland team, it's easy on the eye but results wise meh not fussed..........I don't see any end game at this level of football for us so don't get upset over it we are we where are and have threaded water for 90% of our existence ............as someone mentioned until we can produce an elite player or 2 then I'll start getting invested in the results business

Fandymo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165005#Comment_119165005

1 goal in their playoff match and it would have ended 3-2 to Legia Warsaw, who beat Dundalk 3-1.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165072#Comment_119165072

2 goals so. still that Warsaw team was full of internationals. Dundalk got the Europa league twice in a few years , Kenny was gone the second time but he had laid the groundwork for the second qualification. we don't have the players, its not 1994 anymore but some Irish people don't seem to grasp this.

Bobblehats

You can only work work with the tools that you’re given. How absolute those tools prove remains to be seen

Bobblehats

good threat of another covid jab under Callum robinson’s arse should spur him on to another hat-trick?

Fandymo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165090#Comment_119165090

2 goals would have got them a draw. You need to win to qualify.

Shamrock Rovers would beat Armenia and Luxembourg. This shite about us “not having the players” is just another excuse rolled out for the clown in charge. What powerhouses are the players of Finland, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan or Armenia playing for??

NiceFella

I have some sympathy for Kenny because he is trying something different from our previous teams. The thing is it's simply not working.

The main issue being the obvious lack of any sort of quality in midfield. No creativity or control and we seem to be an open door when teams play us through the middle. I think if we had one decent creative passer in the middle we would be getting a lot better results.

I also think the style we are attempting needs to be trained in at a younger age to be able to play it properly.

Our youth set up may not be there yet in terms of technical football. I've wwatched so many grass roots games with lads kicking t the wing and whipping the ball. It's very old type of ball to play.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165121#Comment_119165121

Like I always say money has ruined football at a high level, the Dundalk players dont earn the money the likes of guys like Jeff Hendrick earns so they care about winning. I would have my doubts half that Irish team even care if they win or not, they are average players but on big money.

Even guys like Troy Parrott who has done nothing in the game is probably on big money, he is more interested in hanging out with gangsters in Dublin, hitting the clubs in designer clothes and watches acting like they are big shots.

completedit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165121#Comment_119165121

We are as bad player for player as those countries you mentioned. TBH I'd say slightly worse.

Hendrick, Hourihane and Parrott are not EPL players. Coleman is not a Premier League player physically. Kelleher is good but is a backup keeper for both us and his club. I don't some actually grasp how poor we are. Seeing Udinese there is interesting but we don't know how Ebosele will get on there and they're a poor team in a poor Serie A. It's only interesting because it's novel. Cullen with Anderlecht is nice but again it's a an average league where the best of the Cullen level players go to Holland when they're not good enough for one of the bigger leagues. We actually have no noticeably good players anymore, the good players are just enthusiastic and fresh(Ogebene) not actually talented.

It's actually at the stage where you barely notice a Bohemians player in the squad list as the teams that the players play for are so poor anyway. 20 years ago a LOI player would have stuck out.

Is that fine young Robbie Keane fellow still on the FAI payroll? If so, then surely Kenny should avail of his talents; furthermore by doing so he'd be able to share the blame when the next shock result occurs!

Xander10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165171#Comment_119165171

Yep. He has some neck.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165190#Comment_119165190

A cynic might argue that he's not the only one! 😉

Fandymo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165141#Comment_119165141

Tell me you’ve no clue about football without saying I’ve no clue about football. Worse players than Luxembourg and Armenia ffs.

osarusan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119164543#Comment_119164543

Grass roots football in Ireland has failed to produce even half decent International footballers, and the LOI should carry a large portion of the blame.

Not really sure what you expect LOI clubs to do. Most are a bad season away from going out of business completely (which has happened often enough).

For sure, there is an issue of a failure to develop domestic talent, and we relied for far too long on English clubs training our best hopes from the age of 14 onwards, which no longer works as firstly, players can't leave quite that young any more, and secondly, these days those clubs can cast their academy nets far wider than just the UK and Ireland, and the number of young Irish players getting places in their academies has dropped.

But I don't see what the LOI can do - they'd love to have loads of qualified, progressive coaches training on state of the art facilities, but the reality is that for most, their budget doesn't stretch much beyond the running of the senior team, if it stretches that far. Athlone Town have maybe 250 people at home games. Even if every person attending was a paying adult, that's maybe 3 grand. Let's generously add in another grand for snacks and programmes and the like, and forget about the taxman. So 4 grand, every second week, for fewer than 40 weeks. You can do nothing other than scrape by with that even without paying any wages, playing woeful football that very few people will pay to see, and so the vicious circle continues. That's the reality for most LOI clubs.

completedit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165289#Comment_119165289

Countries ability isn't set in stone, teams evolve, progress and regress, Ireland has regressed. We are better than Luxembourg but not by much. I'd expect the two teams to be evenly matched whenever we play them. I'd say Finland are better than us.

PokeHerKing

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119164857#Comment_119164857

No it's pretty much the exact same equivalence.

Only 2 could qualify from our group and both teams were vastly superior to Ireland.

It's pure crap to use it as an excuse in one campaign and not in the other.

My opinion is that I still see more upshot to what Kenny is trying to achieve then I see downside. Im not in any cult though. Happy he was given proper time because thats what it'll take and if it doesn't work out then i wont shed any tears when we move onto another manager.

I'll be dissapointed if we move onto a big money manager told to qualify us at all costs tho as its going backwards in my view.

completedit

I don't think we even have a squad to do that anymore; the appetite isn't there. The days of the big ticket manager have passed it seems. Very few nations have marquee managers in charge.

Strumms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119162899#Comment_119162899

He knocked about with them in the qualifying rounds of European cup competitions, that’s ‘doing well’ ?

EmmetSpiceland

There’s a cohort of “fans” who’d be criticising Guardiola or Klopp if they took up the role of Irish manager and tried to get them playing decent football.

€550k a year or €1500k a day wages is not bad going and no expenses when he travels around ireland or the uk or europe scouting players and going on jollies.

The average weekly wage in ireland is €850 a week and if these people only had a 25% success rate at their jobs i doubt they would be give extensions and pay rises like kenny has been

Bobblehats

One of the more profound aspects and I say this as my ma obsesses over the jubilee celebrations (for the umpteenth time) was the tainting of the concept of Irish nationalism which saw many quality British opt for us. Now it’s the other way and has seen us shorn of what would have been our very marketable beckham figure in Grealish and solidity down the spine in Rice. You rear em; through your system yet they identify with someone else-

in football; as in life you replace nationalism with globalism as a tiny island be prepared to become utterly consumed a mere satellite feeder isle. What was our greatest asset has been discouraged and those with dual- quad nationality will potentially opt for a fair few nations who’ll be practically guaranteed qualification from their confederations ahead of d’twee isle - potentially large catch by way of numbers; sure but what slips through the net we’ll end up with. Small fish, in comparison playing out an international career wondering where may have been and with the ability to even switch nationality now as we plummet further down the seedings in this new Nations League format the odds are well and truly stacked

Dav010

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165658#Comment_119165658

I doubt they would be immune from criticism if their results were this bad. Both would be pragmatic enough to realise at this stage that trying to play descent football whilst admirable, has to be accompanied by improvement in results.

Fred Astaire

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165529#Comment_119165529

Both of those teams were the 2 best teams in the competition in 2012.

The two teams in our WC qualification group, one of them wasn't even one of the 24 best teams in Europe a few months prior.

Nonsense, again, from you.

Furze99

Ukraine & Scotland coming up fast - could be a tough time for our Stephen.

Lesnar Defender

"At least we pass the ball around"

Give me a direct style over Kennyball's sideways passes between the back 4 any day of the week. It is passing for the sake of passing.

Wompa1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165021#Comment_119165021

Staunton had a much stronger pool of players to choose from and hey, don't look at me. I didn't think we should have sacked O'Neil. He got results. The quality of players was declining rapidly under him. That was due to the short term planning. I don't see a suitable alternative to Kenny at the moment, at least not one who will have an eye on longer term development. Do you? And if so, who?

Wompa1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165040#Comment_119165040

YEP

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165634#Comment_119165634

He qualified them for the Europa league, in with quality teams from Europe with huge budgets available to them. That is like Andora qualifying for the world cup.

Kenny is doing the strategic thing right which is why he has huge support.

Dav010

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119165930#Comment_119165930

You don’t think winning is strategically important?