Greece 2
Republic of Ireland 1
AT THE END Stephen Kenny stood pale as alabaster stone, diffidently flicked his nose and then plunged his hands into his pockets. Ireland’s ambitions fell with them.
This is now another qualifying campaign that is dead on arrival; another bundle of prospective dreams, screams and stalking hope snuffed out before taking form.
If Ireland were to split the French and the Dutch in this daunting group then they needed to at least avoid defeat away to the group’s fourth seeds. Instead they were not just beaten but utterly overwhelmed by Greece, their extensive preparation shattered by vibrant opponents.
The question that will be thrown at Ireland will be what on earth they worked on in this frictionless build-up. Judging by tonight, they worked on everything except the ability to change.
Gus Poyet took a scalpel to Ireland’s back three and Ireland couldn’t respond, their goals early in both halves sealing a richly-deserved win. Ireland couldn’t adapt, and so their campaign died. It is a deeply damaging defeat for Stephen Kenny.
That Ireland’s best-laid plans would be ruined was foreshadowed in the skies before kick-off. Ireland went to Turkey for 10 days of warm-weather training to acclimatise to the heat and yet their bus to the game had to beat back the floods from a biblical downpour. That set the tone for a night which had something uncomfortable and unruly crackling about; hued by a kind of hectic flush.
There was discomfort too for thousands of Irish fans, locked outside bizarrely shuttered turnstiles up to kick-off, at which point the doors were flung open and fans were ushered through. They were sent to one section of the ground and then moved to another as the game was ongoing.
By then the chaos had been loosed upon the grass. Ireland spent the first 15 minutes taking pain, brutal pain. Greece jabbed their way around Ireland’s defence and then delivered a series of concussive blows from set pieces, Ireland scrambling clear seven corners in the first 10 minutes. The only let-up came when Greece scored, Tasos Bakasetas slamming home a penalty after Callum O’Dowda dangling arm collided with a crossed ball.
A goal down, Ireland instantly put together their first real attack from kick-off, O’Dowda’s cut-back deflected into the Greek goalkeeper’s arms by an alert defender.
Will Smallbone was picked for his full debut partly on the strength of his link-up play with Matt Doherty down the right flank, and their first piece of neat play led to the corner from which Ireland pilfered an equaliser. Evan Ferguson climbed to the skies to arc the corner to the back post, where it was swept into the net by Nathan Collins. The goal was initially flagged for offside, but a lengthy VAR check corrected the error.
But it became quickly clear that Ireland hadn’t forced their way back into the game: Greece allowed them back. They resumed control after the goal, and put on a clinic in how to dismantle Ireland’s back three set-up.
Their width pulled Ireland apart, with Ireland’s wing-backs dutifully tracking Greece’s two wide forwards – Masouras and Pelkas – to the touchline. This gave the Greek full-backs the licence to cut inside, with Kostas Tsimikas skipping by Will Smallbone much too easily, and with options to his left and right, Ireland’s wide centre-backs were rendered moot, caught in no-man’s land. That Greece played this way was not a surprise – Gus Poyet even told his press conference yesterday that they wouldn’t change their system – so to see Ireland so befuddled by it was alarming considering their epic-scale build-up.
Many of the problems would have been addressed if Ireland matched Greece’s 4-3-3, but they don’t have the flexibility to play with a back four anymore, having not played that way since the chastening days of 2020.
Ireland were also dreadful on the ball. Unable to play through the Greek midfield, they Got It Launched to Evan Ferguson and Adam Idah, presumably in the hope of winning the ball high and then involving Doherty and Smallbone. Neither won anything of note, however, and Idah made way for Mikey Johnston at half-time.
But nothing changed. Instead, Ireland maintained the lousy trends of both this game and those previous, conceding four minutes after half-time. Johnston was chiefly humbled, Bakasetas waiting for Masouras to arc a run and slip easily off O’Dowda before rolling the ball through Johnston’s legs. Masouras then strode into a chasm of space with Lenihan MIA, before curling the ball into the bottom corner.
Greece again slacked off when they had the lead. This time, however, Ireland didn’t immediately create much: Nathan Collins snap volley from the box – parried by Vlachodimos – was the sum total of their creativity for the next 30 minutes. Instead they continued to labour prescriptively in their shape, the limits of a back three in attack laid bare again as Ireland played in two distinct sets of five: the back three and two midfielders too often caught pointlessly behind the ball, the front five swamped among blue shirts.
Greece instead lingered dangerously on the counter-attack, and substitute Giorgos Giakoumakis planted a shot wide when it looked easier to score. Kenny changed the prescription for the final 10 minutes, bringing on Michael Obafemi and swapping to a 3-4-3. Ireland forced a couple of corners but their set-piece quality maddeningly left them: Johnston sent a corner long for which Ferguson had come short, and the next from the opposite side was shanked over everybody and out for a throw-in.
It would have been a heist had Ireland got a point. Matt Doherty thought he had pulled it off in stoppage time when he met a loose ball in the penalty area, but Vlachodimos got down to save it.
Instead Doherty was the night’s obvious villain, sent off in the dying minutes for an incident with Tsimikas as tempers frayed. Another hectic flush.
In this city of many esoteric Gods, nothing and nobody could save Ireland.
Republic of Ireland: Gavin Bazunu; Nathan Collins, John Egan (captain), Darragh Lenihan (Troy Parrott, 88′); Matt Doherty; Josh Cullen, Jayson Molumby (Michael Obafemi, 80′), Will Smallbone (Jason Knight, 52′); Callum O’Dowda (James McClean, 53′); Adam Idah (Mikey Johnston, HT) Evan Ferguson
Greece: Odysseas Vlachodimos; George Baldock, Konstantinos Mavropanos, Pantelis Hatzidiakos, Kostas Tsmikas; Dimitris Kourbelis, Petros Mantalos, Tasos Bakasetas (captain); Giorgos Masouras, Vangelis Pavlidis (Giorgos Giakoumakis, 70′) Dimitris Pelkas (Taxiarchis Fountas, 71′)
Referee: Harald Lechner (Austria)