THE possibility of a third consecutive appearance in the World Cup finals, is now significantly, less for the Republic of Ireland after yesterday's precipitous fall in Macedonia.
In what was effectively, a six point game, the Irishmen allowed one of the newest of Europe's Republics back into contention and now face an anxious wait before knowing if they can scramble into the finals in France next summer, in the play off series of second placed teams.
With Romania, the group favourites, winning 1-0 in Lithuania yesterday to supplement their 8-0 trouncing of Liechtenstein last Saturday, it is now more likely than ever that they will qualify automatically by topping the table in group eight.
That would appear to leave Macedonia and Ireland scrambling for a place in the play-offs and on the evidence of the game in Skopje's City Stadium, the odds have now shifted in favour of the Balkan state.
The loss of three points, will be seen to aggravate the concession of two home points to Iceland last November. Macedonia drew 1-1 with the Icelanders at Reykjavik back at the start of the qualifying series and will now be even stronger favourites to win the return match in Skopje in June.
Ireland can still retrieve the situation by winning in Bucharest on April 30th but significantly, this was a goal which don't even rate a line of conversation in a singularly depressed Irish camp last evening.
With the scars of recent trouble in the stadium still evident, the number of riot police on duty in the City Stadium yesterday was wholly disproportionate to a crowd of 8,000.
But the game still held a flashpoint in injury time with the sending off of the Spanish based defender, Mitko Stojkovski, who didn't play at Lansdowne Road last October, and one of Ireland's goalscorers in a 3-0 success that day, Jason McAteer.
McAteer became the first Irish player to be sent off in a World Cup game since Mick Martin and Noel Campbell in Sofia 20 years ago, when he became embroiled in an incident which eventually involved as many as six players.
He is now automatically ruled out of the game in Romania in four weeks time and salt was rubbed into an open wound when Alan McLoughlin, booked in the first game against Macedonia, again had his name taken by the controversial Italian referee, Alfredo Trentalange for an incident involving the ubiquitous Stojkovski.
Like McAteer, he is now excluded from the trip to Bucharest where the Irish team could show as many as four changes from that which sagged to a tame defeat against a distinctly modest Macedonian selection.
To make matters worse, Keith O'Neill aggravated torn ankle ligaments and is now likely to be out of football for a minimum period of a month.
