IF ONE PHRASE summed up the Giovanni Trapattoni era — it was his infamous comment that “we are Ireland”. Essentially implying: why should we strive for high standards when we’re fairly rubbish at football?
More worryingly, Trap’s disconcerting philosophy seemed to influence his side unduly. The more he criticised his men, the worse and less confident their performances in the big games seemed to become. Even the players themselves eventually seemed to accept the Italian’s opinion as fact, with both Stephen Hunt and Robbie Keane at various points suggesting the side were incapable of playing in an attractive manner.
Yet such claims ignore this nation’s fine history of producing technically adept players including John Giles, Liam Brady and Roy Keane. And even ignoring those illustrious individuals, the football that the team produced was not always negative. In the four games that Ireland played at the 2002 World Cup, they had the following possession statistics:
Ireland (46%) 1-1 Cameroon (54%)Ireland (58%) 1-1 Germany (42%)
Ireland (51%) 3-0 Saudi Arabia (49%)
Ireland (55%) 1-1 Spain (45%)
Some people will suggest the side had much better players back then, but did they? The midfield comprised of Mark Kinsella and Matt Holland — two footballers who were good, but hardly great. Are James McCarthy and Darron Gibson that much worse?
Fast forward 10 years later to the Euros and the picture is considerably less rosy:
Ireland (45%) 1-3 Croatia (55%)Ireland (34%) 0-4 Spain (66%)
Ireland (40%) 0-2 Italy (60%)
The pertinent question is: what was the cause of this seismic shift in standard over just a decade of international football? Had Ireland gotten much worse, or had everyone else become much better. Certainly, the Spanish first XI has improved significantly since the early 00s, but they weren’t exactly a bad team back then. Similarly, the German side that Mick McCarthy’s team dominated possession against ultimately reached the final of that World Cup. So if the standard of Irish players has not changed much, surely these recent setbacks have been down to other factors such as attitude and tactical incompetence.
Last night against Latvia however, the Italian’s managerial reign seemed a distant memory, rather than a bittersweet five-and-a-half-year affair that finally came to an end just two months ago.
Under Martin O’Neill, Ireland looked purposeful and re-energised. It was the philosophy rather than the personnel that had changed radically. Indeed, it is not totally inconceivable to imagine Trapattoni picking the same team that O’Neill selected (even Wes Hoolahan started a friendly under the Italian against Georgia back in June).
(Ireland’s assistant manager Roy Keane congratulates Robbie Keane as he’s substituted — INPHO/Donall Farmer)
There was little innate caution and sense of hesitance in their play. The full-backs showed no reluctance to cross the halfway line and the Irish side pushed much higher up the pitch than was normally the case under Trapattoni. In addition, the attendance was approximately 42,000 — against Kazhakhstan it was 20,000 and against the Faroe Islands back in June it was 19,000. Even the home World Cup qualifier against Germany — at the start of the last campaign when optimism should still have been relatively high — attracted 2,000 less spectators.
The fact that over twice as many people showed up for a friendly against one of the worst sides in Europe than two recent World Cup qualifiers (of which one took place when the Irish side were still well in contention for qualification) is a testament to the feel-good factor and sense of optimism created by the appointments of O’Neill and Keane.
Accordingly, compare the possession stats of Ireland-Latvia match to the side’s home World Cup qualifiers against Sweden and Austria:
Ireland (40%) 2-2 Austria (60%)Ireland (47%) 1-2 Sweden (53%)
Ireland (66%) 3-0 Latvia (34%)
Granted, there are obvious problems with these comparisons. Namely, last night’s game came against a team who are the eighth worst side in Europe, according to the FIFA rankings, and who finished second from bottom in their last World Cup qualifying group. And naturally, it showed last night — even if Ireland did manage to put two more goals past them than a World Cup-quality side such as Greece managed in both their qualifiers. Moreover, there were occasional times under Trap when Ireland did have considerably superior overall possession to their opponents, such as the aforementioned game against Georgia.
But it was the manner of the performance against Latvia, rather than the result or possession statistics, which was truly important. Ireland rarely played so well or in as controlled a fashion — even against similarly low-calibre opposition — under Trap. And while the performance yesterday was hardly Barcelona-esque, with long balls and misplaced passes still conspicuous, it was certainly preferable to getting passed off the park by Armenia, among other indignities suffered amid the previous regime.
Sceptics will, perhaps justifiably, remain unconvinced that all the recent hype is warranted until Ireland play with such vigour and occasional panache against a top-level side in a competitive setting. However, if O’Neill really did start as he meant to go on, then last night’s match could be the beginning of something special. That said, the same was suggested the last time an Irish manager got his reign off to a promising 3-0 start. His name? Steve Staunton.
(All statistics courtesy of FIFA and ESPN)
A bit of perspective needed. Yes we played some nice football; and it was refreshing to see and Ireland team pass the ball across the deck, but it was Latvia. Next week against Poland (granted not a top side, but still miles ahead of Latvia) will show how much the team will continue with this philosophy.
I love this “hype machine” horse crap. Just up looking through the papers there – not a single “hyped” headline. the score.ie mearly suggests we played good football and everyone goin’ mad . Absolutely no one in the whole country has said ,since 7.45 last night to now, we are world beaters. “A bit of perspective”? Have u read the article ? It had TOTAL perspective. Any tiny bit of optimism is immediately met with an outcry. It’s you morons had your comments re-written…yes morons
“You gotta put em under pressure” era is back! Watch it again!
While it was Latvia it was nice to see us playing a bit of football. It was entertaining if trap was in charge for that game last night we would not of seen a performance like that.even Glenn Whelan looked good
The most enjoyable Ireland game in quite a while, Latvia were rubbish but even against Kazakhstan in the last campaign we used the usual long ball tactics. Refreshing to see the ball on the grass were it belongs.
We need to calm down here a bit, it’s so easy look good against poor teams in friendlies. It’s when your least exposed.
I’m optimistic too, and I agree with the general point that we’re better than what we saw under trap.
But keep in mind we beat Sweden 3-0 also in a friendly.
I honestly believe even if we perform against Poland and get a good result, we won’t be able to do any decent analysis until a competitive game.
Really you’ve just reiterated everything he said in the article
The hype machine is cranking into full swing again. We beat a team ranked 117 at home in a friendly and we are suddenly world beaters. The most painful thing is that we won’t play a real football match for almost 12 months. So every time a meaningless friendly rolls around for the next year, we have to listen to this crap from the media.
And why the cheap shots at Trap? He delivered 2 decent campaigns after the mess of the Staunton era, granted he should have gone after Euro 2012 but it wasn’t his fault the idiots in the FAI gave him a contract before the tournament started.
Under Brian Kerr I’d say we were the worlds number 1 side at winning friendly games, but beat NOBODY of note when it mattered.
I’ll judge O’Neill on the real thing thanks very much, not on meaningless games like last nights.
The most important result last night from an Irish point of view was Greece’s 3-1 win over Romania, giving us a second seeding for euro 2016 qualifiers.
We haven’t beat a team rated above us in years, trap was better than Stan, that’s about all you can say.
Qualifying is the minimum we should expect.
Well said joe Mahon!! I’ve said here before that the standard of sports journalism in Ireland is shambolic. . . Media builds everything/ team/manager up then turns Turk the minute they the opportunity.The cheap shots at trap are bang out of order, the last camp agin didnt go well but he did have two good campaigns before that and got us to a major tournament which what everyone wanted. Nothing can be judged of this new management set up until we start playing the qualifying games and meet the top teams,but it’s an encouraging start.
Yeah we learned so much last night, Latvia are such an amazing team & that was a stern test….
Journo… Have a day off will ya