Republic of Ireland General Discussion Thread 2026

It says "qualifying ranking" in Wikipedia so what that is it is it.

Low bar anyway.

if there is such a thing as a bottle job then it was a bottle job.

We got a lot of luck to get into an advantageous position and the Czechs had no way to unlock us despite us surrendering field position and then we conspired to lose.

When taking a penalty at least hit the ball hard from a run up.Stop all the stuttering, shitacting, shaping,bolloxing etc

I don't fully agree with that. Even though match day pressure and crowd noise cant be created during practice, a player can hone his own personal penalty kick beforehand. Its a case by case individual player situation. Some need a plan. Browne in particular lacked conviction and looked like he had no idea what he was going to do until he was running up to kick it. If he had decided on where to put the ball and rehearsed it over and over and just stuck to it then he surely would be more confident walking up. Less decisions to make in the pressure situation can only be a good thing for those who are not natural peno takers.

The likes of Parrot in contrast, have the ability to decide on the spot and even wait for the goalkeeper to move in the run up as he did last night.

Cold light of day it was two bang average teams who served up a brutal game. 4 goals, 2 penalties an o.g. from a long throw and a goal off the back of someone's head from a crossed free. No flow in the game, freekicks, corners, long throws rinse and repeat. They were awful and the facts are Ireland couldn't beat them, no midfield, no one to put their foot on the ball in midfield when under the cosh, just bang average. Don't blame anyone for the penalties, a lottery, probably best out of it, Denmark will probably spank that lot.

I'll never get this either. I know these players know better than me but a ball hit with venom gives keeper way less time to get a hand to it.

And a run up probably gives the keeper less time to see your body weight shift and guess your direction. Obviously you've to guard against ballooning the ball wide and first thing to do is hit the target but after that just fng hit it hard.

Gutted today, we sort of bottled it but considering where we were after the Armenia game at least they gave us something to shout about since.

If the players wanted to practice penalties they could have organised a practice session themselves. I doubt HH woul have banned them doing a session outside of normal training.

Awful to single out one player, moment, incident that swung the game hugely. But what Manning did was a disgrace. Cost us a 2 goal lead and really gave them a shot in the arm!!

Yeah I was thinking the same.

They need work. Someone should be flicking them on or else just do a normal throw in and get a cross in.

this one is going to hurt for a while. I genuinely believed throughout the game we would come away and face the Dane’s on Tuesday. have to give it to HH. the team is unrecognisable compared to the start of the campaign and previous mgmt.

we were so calm on the ball in all areas, played great expansive football and for the most of the game we were on top.

Yes, we don’t have the depth, but as a coach he is getting everything from this squad.

It’s just soo refreshing, we should be proud of what the team has achieved. Onwards and upwards but u can’t see us not qualifying for future tournaments if we keep processing with this squad the way we are

last night was nothing new, we’ve seen this Irish mentality thing of cracking under pressure time and time again. Losing a two goal lead in Poland cost us a place at Euro 92, seconds away from automatic qualification to Euro 00 in Macedonia, having Spain on the rack in ET at the 02 WC. Losing a two goal lead v Israel at home cost us a WC 06 play off spot. A famous victory against Italy denied by a 90th equaliser after we scored what looked like the winner in the 87 min.
Theres an old story from before our time of a WC 58 qualifier in Dalyier when Ireland led England 1-0 in the 90th min, guess what?
Interesting to note that neither the mens or womens rugby teams have ever won a knock out match, draw your own conclusions about the Irish mentality.