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It's back to the drawing board for King after two straight defeats. Ryan Byrne/INPHO
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Ireland's U21 European Championship hopes suffer setback in Lithuania

A disappointing night for Noel King’s charges.

Lithuania 3

Ireland 1

AFTER STARTING THEIR campaign with three wins, Ireland’s hopes of reaching the European U21 Championships were dented this evening with a shock defeat in Lithuania.

It’s now two reversals on the bounce for Noel King’s side and a disappointing month sees the Boys in Green sit a point outside the play-off berth in Group 2.

Ireland were caught cold by the hosts in Vilnius and went behind halfway through the first period when Daniel Rogers was well beaten by Lukas Spalvis’ powerful header.

The visitors responded positively and Conor Wilkinson went close to leveling matters but his effort came back off the bar. The Bolton Wanderers striker made no mistake second time around, however.

Wilkinson gathered Reece Grego-Cox’s low cross and drilled the ball home from close range.

But Ireland were on level terms for a matter of minutes before Lithuania, the group’s bottom side, hit the front again.

Simonas Stankevicius was given time and space at the edge of the box and rifled past Rogers and the home side wrapped up their first points of the campaign in the closing minutes through Donatas Kazlauskas.

Ireland face Norway in a friendly in Waterford next Tuesday.

LITHUANIA: Gertmonas, Aleksandravičius, Čerkauskas, Slivka, Šilkaitis, Stankevičius, D. Kazlauskas ( 89), Spalvis, Januševskis, Petravičius, Baravykas.

REPUBLIC OF IRELAND: Rogers, Long, Connors (Grego-Cox 18), Griffin, Lenihan, Browne, O’Dowda, Cullen, Wilkinson (Maguire 81), Byrne (Connolly 65), Kavanagh.

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Why are Ireland and other third-place teams now allowed to qualify for the Euros?

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