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Ireland's Seamus Coleman and Kostas Stafylidis of Greece INPHO/Lorraine O'Sullivan
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Trapattoni on Seamus Coleman: 'He's fantastic'

The Italian was also very impressed by Wes Hoolahan who earned his second international cap at Lansdowne Road.

DESPITE LAST NIGHT’S defeat to Greece at Lansdowne Road, Giovanni Trapattoni insisted afterwards there was plenty to take from the performance.

Not least, according to the Italian, the performance of young players like Seamus Coleman.

“Coleman was fantastic, he was the man-of-the-match,” said the Ireland manager afterwards. “We know him and we have told him he is important to us for the future.

“I have said many times, the midfield of our team is not only the four midfielders, we have two more, the right and left-backs,” he said as he indicated two full-backs bombing on.  ”Seamus is fast, he can recover the ball, he has a very good personality and at the moment he has a very good future.”

Coleman played 90 minutes and was joined in the starting XI with the likes of Ciaran Clark, James McCarthy and Robbie Brady. But Wes Hoolahan too made a real impression, having been introduced at half-time for just his second senior cap.

“He was very good; he confirmed the quality we know he has,” Trapattoni told reporters afterwards.  ”He’s a good option maybe if we need to have one behind the striker and at the moment, we have no other players in this position. Robbie Keane plays there sometimes.

“Football is about results, but we had some good situations and three or four of the players showed their personality in this difficult game. It was very important to have a good performance after the disappointment against Germany. You can see a progression,” he added.

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Player ratings: Ireland v Greece, International friendly

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