1. Ireland bounce back… but little changes
AFTER BEING COMPLETELY played off the park at the Aviva Stadium last week, Ireland made the “recovery” Giovanni Trapattoni had spoken about beforehand. Sure, beating tonight’s opposition (ranked 130 places below the Boys in Green) isn’t something to shout about and it wasn’t a classic display of pass-and-move football but it never is under the current regime. The fact is Trap’s side put more goals than both Germany (3-0) and Sweden (2-1) past the Faroes and are still in the hunt for second place in the group with six points from three games. It doesn’t paper over the cracks though, and the same old criticisms would surely resurface when the next competitive game comes around in four months’ time.
2. Encouraging signs from young players
Shay Given and Damien Duff are gone while Ireland were without Richard Dune, Glenn Whelan and Sean St Ledger meaning Giovanni Trapattoni was again forced to field a number of players with relatively little international experience. And in the main, they gave solid performances. Seamus Coleman and Robby Brady linked up well a couple of times in the first half as we saw what may be the future of Ireland’s right-side before the Manchester United youngster was taken off at half-time. Another competitive debutante Marc Wilson was an improvement on Stephen Ward and capped the rare appearance with a deflected goal, while midfielder James McCarthy is growing in his role with every game. Whoever is in charge of Ireland for the remainder of this campaign, there is reason to be mildly optimistic despite the doom and gloom of the past week.
3. Trap is standing firm
When interviewed after the final whistle, the under-fire Italian talked about the result putting Ireland back on track and continued to insist there was “no problem”. It does appear that the FAI are planning to make a change in management regardless of tonight’s result but the 73-year-old doesn’t want to hear it. He will fly straight back to Italy tonight instead of returning to Ireland for a media briefing that was scheduled for tomorrow. It was initially thought that it may have had something to do with the uncertainty surrounding his future but tonight it was revealed that he is in fact visiting his sister who is ill. The situation seems to be up in the air right now and it will no doubt make for an interesting few days ahead.
