Republic of Ireland General Discussion Thread 2026

That was under Kenny. Now we are much improved.

I've had too many negative experiences getting excited about young players with potential so not going to get too excited about anyone. Umeh is probably the one you'd think has the most potential to go furthest of that lot. We will need to have a look at full backs and the likes of Lawal in the next couple of friendlies. Probably worth checking out any attacking player that has pace as a backup to Ogbene also.

lol what a crazy analogy. Don’t get me wrong have no time for Spurs as a club who seem to have huge resources but 99 percent of the time fail to put together effective teams that win trophies, they seem more interested as a club in accumulating revenue. There wouldn’t be an international equivalent to spurs in terms of chasing revenue being the apparent priority.

In terms of the actual team failing to make the most of the talent available to them I think Belgium in recent years would be a better analogy for Spurs. Every now and then they put together a team with some real talent but after brief showings of promise they more often than not flatter to deceive. Not an exact analogy but a closer one than comparing Spurs with Ireland’s national team.

If you want to compare Ireland (in terms of potential and in terms of delivering on that potential which used to be quite good but has become erratic and inconsistent in recent years) to an EPL team from London maybe West Ham would be a better comparison? Actually come to think of it if we appoint Keif manager at some point we might become the EPL style international equivalent of Brentford. Wouldn’t be bad in terms of performance in relation to talent.

The majority of academy players don't even become professional footballers so you have to temper expectations.

On the list I made, the majority have played senior men's football and a few have been capped by Ireland.

Probably 10 or less will be useful for Ireland senior team.

Devaney, Moorehouse and Finneran might prefer to play for England.

I still think it's interesting to follow their progress.

It'll be interesting to see if Jaden Umeh plays for Benfica 2 next season.

Likewise Ochea Moloney might get promoted with Málaga. He's highly rated.

Millenic Alli has been called up for Tuesday.

Listen to Damo delaney on indo sport and he said the same. You cant play like we did second half an expect to hold on. Whats more frustrating is that we all saw we were as good as, if not, better than that mob. Its definitely a massive chance left behind. Hopefully management learn from it

it seems to have gone unnoticed the similarities between Armenia away and Prague on Thursday . In both matches we looked comfortable and in control for the first 25 minutes and then just fell apart. Coincidentally penalties were the turning point in both matches. The argument is the Czechs are a decent enough side but Armenia are far from decent. The problem is the mentality of the Irish players and yes they did bottle both matches.

the manager himself has conceded this was the problem and they tried to fix it but they couldn’t.

I’m not sure a solution existed within the squad.

They lost the easiest of the 3 games when 2-0 up. If I remember right our rugby team did something similar in the last World Cup. There seems to be a mental brick wall in Irish sport.

They should announce it before really.

If they dive the other way, it'll mainly be because they were tricked into diving that way due to the player's approach. Browne or Azaz did nothing to try throw the keeper off

Doesn't change the fact that they bottled the game badly on Thursday night

Brady's definitely not better than Manning, he was in the past but not now.

Jake O'Brien isn't a typical right back but he plays there.

Ogbene can play RWB.

Festy needs to improve.

Sam Curtis, Abankwah might be options in future.

Realistically though we probably need a left and right back.

I'm assuming Coleman is retiring at the end of season.

I'm hoping we can get him in as a coach.

Brady will probably get another contract for a season.

But it's a year to our next qualifier.