Gavin Cooney reports from Republican Stadium, Yerevan

Armenia 1

Republic of Ireland 0

THE NATIONS LEAGUE remains an endless well of Irish misery. 

It’s now 11 games without a win across the competition, in which Ireland have totalled only two goals. 55 countries have played in the tournament and only San Marino’s goalscoring record is worse than Ireland. 

Tonight, however, was World Cup qualfiying redux: the wretched home loss to Luxembourg merely daubed with colour and drenched in noise and heat in Yerevan. Ireland toiled all night, struggling to break down deep-lying opponents and were then beaten by an audacious long-range goal plucked from the ether.

Last year it was Gerson Rodrigues; this time it was 21-year-old Eduard Spertsyan. His strike from outside the box in the the second half condemned Ireland to an opening-day defeat that smithereens Kenny’s ambition to top the group. 

The heat offers only some mitigation against a lifeless Ireland performance: the pitiless sun was smothered by cloud as kick-off approached, and Ireland have themselves to blame for their curious torpor. 

It was best encapsulated at kick-off: Ireland started the game with half of their players taking a knee, and the other half forgetting. Fair to say it set the tone. Six of the Irish team hadn’t played  a game in at least a month and the ring-rust was evident early on, with a succession of errant passes and clumsy touches from players capable of much better.

It might all have cost Ireland a heavy price under a stricter referee, when a terrible square pass by Nathan Collins sent Duffy lunging into a tackle on Tigran Barseghyan. The referee flashed a yellow card as Armenia howled for red. 

This was Collins’ competitive debut and he made an uncomfortable start. An audacious roulette on the edge of his own box ended with the ball squirting to danger-man Barseghyan, whose first-time shot was tipped sharply around the post by Caoimhín Kelleher, also making his competitive debut in place of the injured Gavin Bazunu. A moment later it was John Egan who was caught dawdling, allowing a pass through to Eduard Spertsyan, whose shot was blocked by a splayed Duffy. 

A regal interception on the halfway line later in the half proved Collins wasn’t consumed by his early jitters. 

That spasm of uncertainty aside, the rest of the first-half took a very predictable pattern, as Ireland tried to jab an opening through a deep-lying defence. And, predictably, it wasn’t too pretty. Armenia shifted from their usual approach to a back five, crouched and asked Ireland to break them down. The premium on space largely blunted Ireland’s plan to send Chiedozie Ogbene and Callum Robinson scampering in behind. 

Jeff Hendrick looked most likely to unpick the lock. In a move that looked more than a little rehearsed, he slid a ball through for Ogbene who squared the ball back for Robinson: the resulting shot was acrobatically hooked away from goal by Hovhannes Hambartsumyan. Roles were reversed in the closing stages of the first-half: this time it was Robinson whom Hendrick found, and Ogbene’s subsequent shot was screwed harmlessly wide.

For all of Ireland’s jabbing, the knockout punch looked most likely to be delivered via a set-piece: Ogbene should have put Ireland ahead on the stroke of half-time, planting a header over the crossbar having been found completely unmarked on Josh Cullen’s free-kick.  

Ireland made a false start to the first half but hardly started the second half at all: the linesman’s flag thwarted a stadium’s ecstasy when Barseghyan brilliantly curled a shot into Kelleher’s top corner. Right wing-back Hambartsumyan was offside in the build-up, the late flag a VAR-mandated cruelty. 

Ireland didn’t react like a side that had felt a bullet whizzing by their shoulder. Instead, they continued their desperate toil. Only once did Ogbene find room behind the Armenian defence, but he was brilliantly dispossessed in the box by captain Varazdat Haroyan. His next move was an emblem of Armenia’s growing confidence, a pass rolled between Robinson’s legs that brought the stadium to its feet. Kenny swapped Obafemi for Parrott and then McClean and Knight for Stevens and a jaded Robinson, but it prefaced disaster. 

Kenny had praised Obafemi’s back-to-goal work ahead of this but he desperately struggled, easily dispossessed to allow Armenia counter, which ended in Spertsyan curling a superb long-range shot in off Kelleher’s right-hand post. 

Spetsyan celebrates the winning goal. Ryan Byrne / INPHO Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO

Ireland have developed a baffling habit of conceding beautiful long-range goals: first against Luxembourg, then against Azerbaijan and now in Yerevan. They cannot keep appearing as aberrations. 

Kenny threw on Will Keane and Alan Browne with Coleman hooked, but he didn’t change the system with Ogbene shifted to right wing-back, the role he plays with his club. Kenny has addressed Rotherham’s use of Ogbene with an air of bafflement but here it at least afforded him some space, and his two late crosses were as close as Ireland came to forcing a goal: the first triggered a panicky pinball which was eventually cleared, the second was just too far ahead of McClean at the back post. 

Duffy ended the game at centre-forward as Ireland laid siege, but they didn’t come close to scoring: Armenia weren’t exactly hanging on. 

A wretched start. 

Armenia:  David Yurchenko; Hovhannes Hambartsumyan; Varazdat Haroyan (captain), Hrayr Mkoyan, Arman Hovhannisyan (Stypoa Mkrtchyan, 61′); Kamo Hovhannisyan, Artak Grigoryan, Eduard Spertsyan, Tigran Barseghyan; Khoren Bayramyan, Vahan Bichakhchyan (Sargis Adamuyan, 55′)

Republic of Ireland: Caoimhín Kelleher; Nathan Collins, Shane Duffy, John Egan; Seamus Coleman (captain) (Will Keane, 80′); Josh Cullen (Alan Browne, 80′), Jeff Hendrick; Enda Stevens (James McClean, 72′); Chiedozie Ogbene, Troy Parrott (Michael Obafemi, 65′); Callum Robinson (Jason Knight, 72′)

Referee: Radu Petrescu