New thread as the last thread seems to be broken.
Coleman was excellent on Saturday night but was as poor as anyone in his previous games before dropping out of the squad.
That's part of our problem, no consistency in our performances. It's getting to the stage that if a player has a good game he should be dropped for the next.
These players pretty much play all in Champions league and top clubs.
Thats not good enough?
can you cite what performances in particular you believe he was poor in?
Jack Taylor given 6 jersey for tonight. Might mean little come hour before kickoff. Taylor offers bit more technically than Moulmby
I'd guess Molumby will still be involved with Cullen out anyway. Molumby's technically limited, but Armenia will work hard and fight so we do need a bit of combative energy in the middle to match that, which unfortunately not many of our other options bring. I wouldn't be shocked to see Coventry come straight into the starting 11 either.
Taylor apparently hasn't played a minute with his club, since the Armenia away game.
A game in which he was pretty poor.
I'm starting to think that Conor Coventry might well feature at some stage.
neither did Seamus Coleman. It’s becoming apparent to me that club form is a fairly irrevalent indicator towards selection in the Irish jersey.
Since all of our players have been enduring a difficult spell with their clubs since the Armenia game it’s not an indicator of anything much right now IMO.
I would have guessed it will be Molumby, Smallbone and Azaz in midfield with Ferguson, Parrott and Ogbene/Festy up top. Think we'll go back to a back 4 tonight
Technically incorrect. Seamus played one minute for Everton against Crystal Palace.
You know things are getting very desperate when politicians in Dáil Éireann are calling for the ROI and NI soccer team to merge.
https://www.thejournal.ie/independent-ireland-call-for-republic-of-ireland-and-northern-ireland-to-merge-6844188-Oct2025/
Kosovo
Macedonia
Faroes
Albania.
So all this stuff is not impossible.
Germany are still a very good side. They were strong at the Euros last year. It took a goal in the 120th minute from a super Spanish team to eliminate them in the QF. I'd argue they were really the 2nd best side in that tournament. England stumbled into the final, but were poor and were on the very easy side of the draw…….France were not much better.
Germany still have plenty of quality. 5 Bayern players in the side last night as well as guys from Liverpool, Dortmund, and Newcastle.
And N. Ireland pretty much matched them for most of the game.
We defended well for the 90 mins but we offered zero in attack. Very little possession so when you're playing a good team away it's like playing up a steep hill all game. It was too late in the competition to be playing for a point imo. We had two shots in the game with none of them on target. a point was as useless as no point. We nearly succeeded in frustrating Portugal but I was also frustrated. It is nearly impossible to defend for 90 minutes against the likes of Portugal away anyway.
think I’ll be left waiting …
smallbone hasn't played at all really this season afaik
3 at the back so. No harm
Yup in H2H for recent games they've beaten us twice and our one win it took a late injury time penalty to beat them.
Would have rather seen Parrott starting ahead of Ebosele and having two strikers on the pitch.
Unless it ends up being Ebosele RWB, Coleman RCB, Collins anchoring midfield with Azaz playing off Ferguson.
Got it spot on
Dan McDonnell saying he'd be a bit surprised if it's the same shape as Portugal going on comments by HH yesterday.
Reckons it will be 4411 with O'Shea LB.
Sadler says about Irish tv commentators "We don't stick the boot in like....previous years". Cough Dunphy cough 😀
Can't understand why you'd have Ebosele over Parrott. Thought he was terrible against Portugal every time he got the ball. Needs to seriously up his game tonight.
Give us hope Heimir
Interesting to see how we go tonight. Come on Ireland
Sadler was talkng about how tv commentary is about being critical when things are bad but positive when things are good. But also saying they dont stick the boot in like previous years. To me that sounds hes alluding to the tv panel up to a few years ago.
Hope before the mornin comes.
Well HH did manage Jamaica, home of reggae 😀
Doyle is growing on me as a pundit.
Anyone know the tune theyre playing sporadically throughout the programme so far? I think its Sisters of Mercy?
I would hope for a big game from Azaz.
Hoping for more from Festy tonight too compared to his performance against Portugal.
Where did I say it was "on par", just calling out the on a different planet nonsense. Up to the last 15-20 minutes they were awful, I think at that stage they had circa 29% possession and at 1 down had to go for it.
