A Greek journalist in the Aviva Stadium on Tuesday night could not believe his ears, turning around and asking incredulously, “Did the announcer just name Will Smallbone as man of the match?”
“Yes, but not really,” we explained. “It’s so the national broadcaster can interview an Irish player on the pitch at full-time. Sure, Chiedozie Ogbene won it against England.”
The visiting correspondent had already turned around to inform his colleagues who laughed at the latest, ridiculous occurrence connected to Irish football.
About an hour later, Republic of Ireland manager Heimir Hallgrímsson calmly explained how confidence levels can be rebuilt, following the worst run of senior men’s results since 1971.
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The Icelander only arrived in Ireland last month. The squad he inherited lost both Nations League games 2-0, to England and Greece, in three days but Hallgrímsson believes the wins will come when the players become more familiar with each other and his “principles”.
Anyone watching Ireland play football these past four years could have told him this squad has been together all that time, losing 11 of their last 14 competitive matches.
The 2020s are now comparable to 1946-1950, when Ireland lost 12 of 19 internationals. And 1967-1971, when the national team went 21 games without a win, losing 14.
Ancient history lessons go over Hallgrímsson’s head, but he does understand the enormity of the present-day task.
“We can all agree that Ireland doesn’t have a match winner at this stage,” he said. “We don’t have a Zlatan, Messi or Ronaldo or the high-profile players, like Wales had Gareth Bale in the past, such as Roy Keane, playing at the highest level.
“If we want to grow, it has to be collective. From there, players will gain confidence from organisation and structure.
“From defending without the ball, you can feel confident. You can control the game without the ball. Once that happens, we’ll start to get points and we’ll grow in confidence.”
Hallgrímsson continued: “Some players will hopefully be fitter [in October]. We gave Evan [Ferguson] his first minutes of the season. Hopefully that will help Brighton select him more. He will be a huge asset for us when he’s fit.
“I think we saw that Kasey McAteer is one for the future.
“Now our job is to try to find the correct players and just play them, not always rotating them.”
Hallgrímsson’s predecessor, Stephen Kenny, sold a similar line to the public after building a young squad, but his efforts to settle on a regular line-up was denied by repeat injuries to Ferguson, Ogbene and Séamus Coleman at crucial junctures.
At least Kenny had the constant midfield presence of Josh Cullen and goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu, who both missed this international window through injury.
Glenn Whelan, who won 91 caps for Ireland and is currently working for the FAI as an opposition analyst, even travelling to Athens for Greece’s 3-0 defeat of Finland on Saturday, swapped his scouting job for television punditry on Tuesday.
“We shot ourselves in the foot,” Whelan told Virgin Media Sport. “Jason Knight gives the ball away and goes chasing after it, makes a mistake, followed by another mistake, which gave the Greeks a chance to press forward.
“The ball at the edge of the box, you only have to look at the amount of Irish players around the ball and no one goes to get tight, [Fotis Ioannidis] gets the shot away and we are 1-0 down.
“The disappointing thing for me, once the goal goes in, I see heads go down, arms thrown up, it is not a positive thing in this Irish team at the moment.”
Whelan suggests another “reset” by dipping into Jim Crawford’s talented under-21 squad, where Sam Curtis and Andy Moran are keeping Ireland on course to qualify for the Euros after victory in Turkey and a 2-2 draw against Latvia in Tallaght on Tuesday.
“If it is a case of looking at the 21s and bringing them lads in to change it, because there are too many lads over the last four years who have consistently lost for Ireland,” said Whelan.
Out with the new, in with the newer has already been done, with Kenny promoting an entire crop of under-21s, including Smallbone, Ferguson and Adam Idah, between 2019 and 2022.
As one FAI official confirmed, systemic problems are hurting the senior men’s team. Due to a €43.2 million debt, the Association cannot help to fund professional coaching in club academies, which is precisely where the FAI’s pathways plan, designed by its chief football officer Marc Canham, is directing elite talent.
This is above Hallgrímsson’s pay grade, as the 57-year-old was only hired on an 18-month contract.
The initial job description for the “head coach” to replace Kenny, was a contract running to Euro 2028 with responsibilities to implement a style of play from underage teams into the senior squad. This idea, however, was shelved during a nine-month recruitment process led by Canham.
“I saw improvement from the England game and from what I saw before,” said Hallgrímsson. “Maybe I am being too positive, maybe you disagree, but until the [Ioannidis] goal, I was really happy.
“We need to play better. I’m not hiding behind that.”
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