Republic of Ireland General Discussion Thread 2026

ah they were always decent - that side had raul, casillas, puyol, mendieta. Spanish clubs had made the three previous champions league finals and won two of them. We were good, but not that level.

This. I have a season ticket in England and have one at Waterford.

In England, it’s a magnificent event, unbelievable standard of football and wonderful facilities. And there’s something great about being amongst 50,000 people who support the club you do. I love it. But it’s also full of nobs who are there for the event like that clown who went to watch Ronaldo. Drives me mad seeing people taking selfies during the game not even facing the pitch, recording opposition fans celebrating a goal or leaving 10-15 mins early. I see those things regularly.

Last Friday I was at Waterford v Bray in the play off. Absolutely belting atmosphere where both sets of fans made noise for 90 minutes straight. When we went behind, our really hardcore just kept singing and that got the rest of us joining in. The lads on the pitch were brilliant too with the effort and lack of bullshit.

The EPL is absolutely light years ahead of LOI in terms of quality of football but the LOI is everything football should be in terms of atmosphere and sheer competitiveness. Well worth going every Friday.

Virgin Media also had the England v Serbia match last night … I’d say the amount of people who watched that you could count on one hand, I wonder why they bother.

two not three

I

Yeah I have heard them sing the Auld triangle and other Irish songs, great to hear at football games.

I would disagree with the poster who said league of Ireland isnt really suitable for kids. I sit in the stand of my team and never heard anything too bad at all, maybe a bit of cursing but sure you will get that a lot more at GAA games in my experience and them games always have lots of kids and families. '

Sure even when ther is VAR penalties don't go our way.

They are playing great though against a team that could do well in senior games.

Be a sad day soon when Seamus Coleman packs it in. The legs clearly arent what they used to be but still has the street smarts. So dependable.

Pity we cannot put Seamus’s will and determination into Matt Doherty who just seems like he doesnt give a **** one way or another.

I think the only reason Ireland won yesterday was because they brought Seamus back. He will be Ireland manager one day im sure.

I would agree. He brings a steeliness and refusal to accept second best type of attitude.

Anyway great to be looking forward to a match Sunday. Hasnt been that way for a while.

Delighted for HH and the team, HH has taken a huge amount of stick since taking over, but, bar the Armenia disaster, which was really poor, there has generally been progress. People seem to forget how poor performances and how low morale was under SK, campaigns were effectively over after 2/3 matches, trying to play a brand of football that the players weren't capable of, instead of playing to our strengths. HH has at least brought in a bit of structure and organisation to the team, making us more difficult to play against and playing more to our strengths.

It's great to be heading into the last match of the group with a genuine chance of making the play -offs, win, lose or draw against Hungary, as least we are in with a shout, something most of us had written off. The team has shown great character to bounce back into contention again.

I think it's not unreasonable to expect to get to the last match of the group and at least have a mathemathical chance to progress, however slim, that's what was so disappointing about the SK era, we never even got close to doing anything, always supposedly rebuilding or in transition, but, it was same story in the next campaign.

Im delighted for the country the fans the players and the coach but its meaningless without a win tomorrow.

Losing to Armenia was a disaster, HH and the team were rightly criticised after it.

We could be talking about topping the group tomorrow if we had beat Armenia.

If we win tomorrow ill happily talk of progress under HH. Lose and we're pretty much where we were under SK.

Absolutely, only injury time away from beating them in Portugal under SK. Drew at home etc. All very similar to HH.

Portugal had plenty of chances on Tuesday. Easily a different result and we're out already.

Im under no illusion. I was an SK fan so I personally just see slightly different scenarios playing out as opposed to some magic tactic that HH knows that SK didnt.

I dont want to start another thing here but like thats just your opinion man.

It’ll be disappointing if we don’t win tomorrow especially if we go down without much of a fight. But it won’t make Thursday meaningless. Not by a long shot.

We beat a top team comfortably in a competitive fixture for the first time since 1998 v Croatia. That’s never going to be meaningless.

No way should we go out and say “well we’ve given it a good go whatever happens”. We should go there doing everything we can to win the game but the win v Portugal gives hope for the future and should guarantee the manager another campaign IMO.