New thread as the last thread seems to be broken.
They say don’t change a winning team.
But Thursday was a huge effort and there’s not much recovery time. Manning and Molumphy are options, if we’re unsure about Azaz or Taylor.
The Hungarians calling us British in their press conference. Some things never change.
Kenny never had us in this position. Its no contest between the two.
Going down a man didn't mean much.
The man in question was a hindrance and they were well beat and lucky not to be more behind at that stage.
Yup we're a small country that has no footballing industry and treats it as more of a past time. Hopefully Thursday night serves as big momentum for tomorrow but if things don't work out you are 100% correct it doesn't make Thursday night meaningless. Results like that will never be meaningless for countries like ours.
Not in this position but the point was this team have raised it before only to revert back to shte. That could easily happen again tomorrow.
Once the performance is there tomorrow, nothing will be undone from what happened on Thursday. Even if we don't end up beating Hungary. And let's face it, away from home, over there, it will be extremely difficult.
If we play very well tomorrow and still don't manage to get over the line, at least the team will have improved to the point where we can look ahead to the Euros campaign with a lot of positivety.
I suspect that the fact that with both teams looking over their shoulder tomorrow will be very cagey.
0-0 or 0-1 ???
They were far from well beat at that stage.
There was half an hour left. Wed already been playing seige football since before the end of the first half.
Ronaldo should have been subbed and if Portugal could finish a chance theyd have at least had one back before he was sent off.
Anyway it was a great win. Delighted for everyone. The team beat what was in front of them. If we revert to form tomorrow itll be a blip and nothing else to me.
People looking to put it in their family album is sad imo but each to their own.
Don’t agree with this thing that not getting a result tomorrow means we’re just the same as we had been. Getting to the last day with a playoff in our own hands IS progress. Going from two wins against Gibraltar and tamely losing every other game in the group, to going unbeaten at home with two wins and a draw IS progress.
Sounds a bit like some have their nose put out that we won, Jesus saying Kenny was unlucky is very generous in the extreme, he was a clusterfuck, nice fella and I wanted him to succeed as you could see it meant a lot to him, but, he was out of his depth, HH is little over a year in the role, inherited a totally demoralised squad with no world class players, but, at least has us in a position where we have a decent chance of making the play-offs. Portugal are one of the top teams in the world and were always going to top the group and Hungary have been significantly better than us over the last few years and would be expected to get second place. Realistically, third was always our most likely position, with an outside chance of getting second or fourth! Progress has definitely been made, whether people like it or not.
I guess its just desperation to try and somehow make the SK era not look like a clownshow. Its chalk and cheese. They'll be wanting the Hungary win to "prove" Heimir failed.
Before the qualifying started I'm pretty sure most of us said we would take progression as a positive and the real goal was being ready for the home Euros.
Sk got 4 campaigns in sense.
We failed beat Slovakia for Euro 2020, we were out of WC campaign after 2 games for 2022. Finished a very disappointing 3rd in nations league followed up by losing 6 from 8 for Euro 2024.
No, no its not similar.
Kenny was a shambles. A painful period in Irish football.
Hopefully the next few years are brighter
if your counting the nations league campaigns he got 5 altogether : the one where Bulgaria finished bottom and the one where Armenia did
He wasn't up to standard as an international manager but to be fair it wasn't all his fault. He had the poorest players collectively ever to play for Ireland available to him (feel free to argue otherwise). No manager was going anywhere with those squads.
I don't think we will win tomorrow yet HH deserves a contract extension to Euro 2028. We are heading in the right direction. Both performances against Portugal were excellent and tactically sound.
Also is there any hope our bankrupt dump of an association will get someone better. I hope he stays. There's just something about his kinda grumpy depressed demeanor that suits us. Jack, Mick, Martin and Giovanni all had it.
I see the Stephen Kenny disciples are still going strong on here. The ones that told us after Luxembourg beat us at home, that this was our level and we were too ambitious if we expected more
In the last game at least, Heimir managed to get Ireland to play as they need to play, which is being defensively solid/ compact, and dangerous on the break. And that against good opposition: #5 in the world.
My view is we needed to see demonstrable progress, even if we don't actually achieve anything in this campaign - we need to have performances or results that show things are going in the right direction and the team are improving, and we have that now.
As fans and supporters we needed something, some hope.
Qualifying for the world cup is probably too great an ask at this stage, and we have had some horrible results in this group (notably Armenia), but we are now improving and going in the right direction
A win away to Hungary will be difficult, but we now need to see another spirited and competitive performance. If we get that, it may be enough to allow Heimir more time - what are the alternatives?
We will win 2-1 tomorrow. Going be a great day
Until we find a midfield there are no alternatives. We would look ridiculous getting rid of a manager who somehow engineered a clean sheet win over Portugal with this team no matter what happens tomorrow.
That's 11-1 on Coral 🙂
I for one will gladly eat my hat with salt and vinegar if HH pulls off a miracle.
The anti SK brigade are the ones that brought him up here not the fan bois.
One swallow does not make a summer. SK had decent performances, ironically against Portugal as well. It never amounted to anything as wed lose to weaker opposition afterwards.
A decent performance today and ill happily call it progress. Anything more and ill kneel at the HH alter. Anything less and its business as usual.
Yeah right.
I certainly was not "anti Sk" and every Irish fan wanted him to be a success.
Nobody was expecting miracles but we were awful especially for Euro 2024. Actually it was car crash stuff.
He was given a free pass for Euro 2020, the nations league that followed and World Cup 2022. No other manager would have got that.
We created so little chances under Kenny. Truly demoralising stuff.
How much more time do people want give him?
We scored plenty of goals under SK?
Anyway im not looking for him to be reinstated. I've moved on, his detractors haven’t.
This topic was reignited by a detractor claiming one result for HH was a reason to throw $hit at SK.
Thank god we found our actual level, splitting wins with Armenia.
Kenny got 1 big result in 5 campaigns and that was against Scotland. 1 goal in 2020 NL campaign. 1 goal from open play for Euro 2024 against the teams that mattered.
Today is big day for us and HH. Im not sure he is the guy to lead us. Today will tell a lot.
But Kenny got so many chances no other Ireland manger will ever get. He didn't take one of them. Thats on nobody but him. I wish him well. He seems good man and for him it was dream job. But it was not to be.
