Shay Given: An uncharacteristic mistake for the Estonian goal scarred an otherwise steady evening. 5.
Sean St Ledger: Made his challenges and won his aerial duels. 6.
Stephen Ward: Scored his second international goal. Better going forward. Solid when defending. 7.
John O’Shea: Dependable in defence, average in attack. 6.
Richard Dunne: Defended diligently when called upon. 6.
Glenn Whelan: More confident on the ball, brought his usual doggedness off of it. 7.
Stephen Hunt: Set the tempo early but faded before being replaced. 6.
Keith Andrews: Didn’t replicate his performance in Tallinn but generally comfortable in the middle. 6.
Kevin Doyle: A typically committed and intelligent display. 7.
Robbie Keane: A glaring miss in the first half but as ever, never stopped trying to sniff out something. 6.
Damien Duff: Ireland’s best player. Full of invention and emptied the tank. 8.
Subs
Aiden McGeady: Made an immediate impact after coming on. Becoming increasingly comfortable at this level. 7.
Keith Fahey: Tidy in what little time he had. 6.
Simon Cox: Worked hard but found service hard to come by. 6.
Do you agree?
Well done the boys in green
The only thing Robbie keane was sniffing out was the farts in the wind , sorry people but again he missed a chance that a international striker should be scoring . Van persie , Rooney to name but two , miss like that maybe once, twice a year , but keano seems to do it nearly every game. When we go to the Euros you can afford not to take chances like that
Jesus lads, you’re depressing me. So what if it wasn’t a great performance. It’s job done. We’re going to a finals finally after 10 years of just being spectators. We’re not Brazil and will probably never have the players like we did in the 80′s but somehow thanks to Traps and some honest performances from average players we’re there. Surely that must at least make you smile or not frown…
Not a great game at all – dismal , to be honest ! Keane needs to step up his game !
Ireland were lucky not to have been beaten on home soil ! !
A 1-1 draw was the best they could muster on home ground.
Embarrassing. They won’t get out of te first round.
It their first time in the 1st round for 24 years. Like it!
“We’re all part of Trapy’s army…”
Bill O Herlahy did not know what keepy uppy was – and he discusses soccer at a huge wage. Real Irish Great effort over both games.
Yeah, Lineker does such a good job of it on the BBC. That cheeky chappy.
How do you do one of those rolly-eyed smilies?
fyi
The draw for the final tournament will take place on 2 December 2011 at the Ukraine Palace of Arts in Kiev, Ukraine.[35]. The draw will take place at 18:00 CET (19:00 Local Time).
As was the case at the 2004 and 2008 finals, the sixteen finalists will be divided into four seeding pots, ranked by their UEFA coefficient, with each of the four groups having one team from each pot.
Pot 1 will include Poland and Ukraine, as co-hosts, Spain, as defending champions, and the Netherlands as the team with the next highest co-efficient ranking. The other teams can only be allocated pots after the conclusion of the qualifying process in November, as teams that are participating in qualifying play-off ties may still alter their coefficient ranking due to their results in said qualifying play-off ties.
Nah, no way. How did you come to these scores? They’re no better than average
Truth hurts ! Some people
Good job lads. Not a fan of the style- but, that said, needs must.
Enjoyed the atmosphere tonight. Up there with some of the good nights over the last 34 years of attendance.
Special kudos to Estonian players and fans for their magnanimity. Outstanding.
Am I the only one who things mcgeady is crap. Can dance around players but could cross the road.
He did more in the 20 or so minutes he had than Hunt did in 70 minutes. At least 2 decent efforts on goal and added a bit of life to the game. I’d prefer to see him start and Hunt come on for 20 mins at the end.
Shay Given, scared or scarred? Learn to spell please.
scarred.
Scare-let!
We’d a ball tonight, we were in the singing section, totally new to us. We loved every second of it. Very proud to be Irish.
How does Seamus Coleman not make the bench, and how does James McCarthy not get a chance to prove yourself at all throughout a tie that was decided last friday?
Totally agree with you in Coleman. I’m inclined to reserve judgement on McCarthy until he’s playing more regularly. We’ve seen too many messiahs in recent years (Healy and Miller to name but two to get too excited about wee James. He’s only made 6 appearances this season with Wigan this year (and only 50 EPL appearances in total) – which is hardly ‘knocking down the door’ to get into the team.
Some ignorant comments here about us only getting a draw. We didn’t need to win. Shay Given was getting sleepy in the goal, he had no worries. Who cares that he let 1 in, charitable Shay. We won 5-1 in case you people forgot.
Come on the Boys in Green!!
The last two comments were nice, cheers. As for the whole scared/scarred thing, there is no need for adjectives. Journalism 101.