IRELAND ASSISTANT BOSS Roy Keane has played down the significance of Poland’s surprise 2-0 win over Germany last night.
The reigning world champions are favourites to win the group, however they suffered a considerable setback in Warsaw last night, and many believe it could make life more difficult for the Irish team on Tuesday night knowing they will be facing a team eager to make up for their slip-up yesterday.
Though Keane said he had yet to watch the full game, he denied being surprised by the result.
“I’ve seen the goals. We’ll get a chance to watch it later today. Whatever the result was over there, it was going to be a tough game anyway for us.
“Poland are a decent team. We said before that it’s a tough group. Germany are obviously favourites but the Poles are very good. They’re big and strong, they’ve got [Robert] Lewandowski, so they’re a good team.
“It doesn’t change our mindset. We know it’s going to be a tough game [on Tuesday].”
In addition, Keane said he was “pleased” with yesterday’s comprehensive win over Gibraltar, while admitting that he probably didn’t learn too much from the game.
“It was a decent win, a good atmosphere and nice to see a few goals, but of course we face a different challenge now on Tuesday against better opposition.”
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He also dismissed the importance of the fact that Ireland failed to score after Wes Hoolahan and Robbie Keane were taken off on 63 minutes.
“Players will ease off a little bit. Sometimes it’s hard in any game to keep going for 90 minutes. The manager said there was a little bit of sloppiness, which can happen. You could say the job was done after 15 minutes.”
And finally, when asked about whether John O’Shea took any offence over Keane’s new book, in which he jokingly suggested that the defender sealed Cristiano Ronaldo’s move to Manchester United by playing so badly during a match against him, the assistant boss quipped:
“No, because Sheasy’s got a brain, he knows what was said, unlike the rest of you.”
