Updated at 11.55
- Paul Fennessy reports from Lille
1. How many changes will Ireland make?
IN THE EURO 2016 pre-match press conferences, journalists from the opposition’s media sometimes approach members of the Irish press to ask for their predicted starting XI, and vice-versa.
Usually, you would be fairly confident on giving your thoughts on the matter, but the opposite is true for the Italy game.
There has been talk of Daryl Murphy, Stephen Quinn and Richard Keogh all coming in, while Martin O’Neill is rumoured to be considering dropping James McCarthy, Ciaran Clark and Wes Hoolahan.
In his pre-match press conference, O’Neill used the word “energy” on a couple of occasions, which suggests some of the more experienced and to be frank, slower members of the team, such as John O’Shea and Glenn Whelan, may have to settle for a place on the bench.
Up until now, Martin O’Neill’s Ireland sides have had a degree of predictability about them.
Granted, there is the odd surprise, but for the most part, the experienced coach has stuck with the same group of players.
Usually, whenever Ireland play, you know McCarthy, Whelan, O’Shea, Walters and Coleman to name a few will feature if fit — they are a core group of footballers that the manager trusts.
And while the Belgium setback was just O’Neill’s third competitive defeat in over two years as Ireland manager, it was by far the most resounding loss he has suffered during his tenure with the Boys in Green.
Ringing the changes is not necessarily a policy doomed to failure, as Northern Ireland have shown already in this tournament, dropping five players ahead of the Ukraine triumph. However, it’s a calculated gamble, as should it backfire, the Irish manager could potentially alienate senior players, fans and critics alike.
But whether or not O’Neill decides to stick or twist, the starting XI is bound to cause some controversy — if you asked 10 Irish football fans what tonight’s lineup should be, they would probably come up with 10 different teams.
2. Will Ireland show some ‘balls’
One of Ireland’s main problems during this tournament has been their inability to keep the ball.
In matches against Sweden and Belgium, they have managed just 43% possession on both occasions.
Though O’Neill’s team have sporadically tried to play football, most noticeably in the first half against Sweden, for the most part, there has been a stark negativity about Ireland that doesn’t sit right with many fans and critics.
One telling stat is that in the first half of the Belgium game, no Irish player made more attempted passes than goalkeeper Darren Randolph, epitomising their hoof-ball tactics.
In Monday’s press conference, assistant boss Roy Keane urged Ireland to show “courage and balls”.
He wanted Ireland’s players to show some initiative, to get on the ball and make things happen, rather than letting the opposition dictate the play as was the case at the weekend.
In 90 minutes, last Saturday, the Boys in Green didn’t get one of their 10 shots on target against Marc Wilmots’ side and were generally outclassed by the better team on the day.
However, Ireland have proven they can keep the ball against decent sides such as Poland and Scotland, as explained here.
And Italy, while undoubtedly being one of the best teams in the competition, don’t tend to hog the ball in the same way as Belgium, so Ireland should expect to have better possession on this occasion.
Yet even if Ireland do enjoy superior possession, whether that can be translated into goals remains to be seen.
The Boys in Green traditionally don’t tend to be prolific scorers — Wes Hoolahan’s strike against Sweden was just the fourth-ever goal scored by an Irish player at the Euros, after Ronnie Whelan, Ray Houghton and Sean St Ledger.
Under Martin O’Neill, in competitive fixtures, if you discount matches against Gibraltar, they’ve averaged just a goal a game.
Moreover, they are coming up against an Italian side renowned for its defensive organisation, even if they choose to rest a star centre-back such as Giorgio Chiellini, someone else is expected to slot in seamlessly to this finely tuned system they utilise so expertly, with cynical fouls and time wasting vital in stopping opponents’ momentum.
So whether or not Ireland’s misfiring attack can breach this stubborn rearguard will likely be the difference between going home on Thursday and staying another few days in France, with the hosts the most likely opponents in Lyon in the last-16 on Sunday should the Boys in Green pull off an unlikely victory.
3. How big an impact will the dodgy pitch have on proceedings?
The cliché about bad pitches is that both teams “have to” play on them.
And while this may be true, you get the sense that the poor playing surface at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy in Lille may suit Ireland more so than their rivals. Martin O’Neill’s men need to turn this game into a war, and a dodgy pitch will help that happen.
Italy boss Antonio Conte certainly seemed frustrated about its current state, with groundsmen busy at the work tending to it on Tuesday and both sides barred from training on it.
“The playing surface definitely isn’t up to hosting a European championship match. It’s not in the best state,” the Azzurri boss said, speaking at the pre-match press conference yesterday.
“I don’t like coming up with excuses for my players, because we will play on this pitch tomorrow night and so will Ireland. However, we did expect a different pitch to this one, and it is a shame because the Euros have been organised very well so far.”
Indeed, with two more games, a last-16 match and a quarter-final due to take place in Lille, Uefa has intervened and agreed to replace it after the Ireland match.
Meanwhile, you get the sense that the Irish camp is not quite as annoyed about this situation as the Italians.
When Stephen Ward and Wes Hoolahan were asked about the issue at a press conference on Monday, the former joked: “Myself and Wes have played in the League of Ireland so we’re used to bad pitches.”
4. Could this be France 2009 all over again?
In a recent column for The Sunday Independent, Stephen Hunt compared the situation Ireland are now faced with to the one his team encountered in 2009.
Just like Ireland know they have to beat Italy in Lille this evening, back in 2009, the Boys in Green required a victory over France in a second-leg World Cup 2010 play-off.
The Irish team had been written off after the first-leg, as Nicolas Anelka’s 72nd-minute strike silenced Croke Park and ensured a miserable evening for the home team.
Following the loss, just as is the case now after the Belgium defeat, few believed Ireland were capable of turning the situation around. They were “not good enough” to compete with a side of France’s quality according to many observers.
Of course, what happened next went down in infamy. Giovanni Trapattoni’s side produced their best performance possibly ever up to that point, with Robbie Keane’s goal taking the game to extra time, before Thierry Henry’s hand proved decisive as the French scraped through.
There are consequently many similarities with tonight’s match. Ireland’s backs are to the wall, few people expect them to prevail and they’re facing a side whose desire to win the game is questionable — despite Conte’s insistence to the contrary.
5. Can O’Neill outwit Conte?
As far as Ireland are concerned, some have argued that the coaching staff as well as the players have had a disappointing tournament thus far.
In the game against Sweden, Martin O’Neill simply failed to react sufficiently to the growing threat down the Swedish left-hand side of the pitch, with Erik Hamrén’s team’s attack-minded full-backs increasingly exposing Ireland’s lack of width owing to their continued reliance on the diamond formation.
The Belgium game was even worse from a coaching perspective — Ireland looked a side with no coherent gameplan or belief in the system they were implementing. The Irish attack was more or less entirely nullified, while the Boys in Green’s management team again did not react quick enough to the growing Belgian threat — they were 2-0 down by the time the first substitution was made.
In Italy, O’Neill faces another stiff test, with the countless aforementioned selection dilemmas. Moreover, in Antonio Conte, he is up against a coach whose reputation is arguably greater than any other manager in the competition. In Tuesday’s pre-mach press conference, Gianluigi Buffon lavished praise on his manager, highlighting Conte’s “tactical approach, his ability to bring a side together,” adding that there is “a willingness of players to follow him”.
Martin O’Neill, by contrast, has been heavily criticised of late, with naysayers accusing him of being overly conservative and old-fashioned.
An Ireland win tonight, however, would go some way towards reversing the negative perceptions about the 64-year-old coach’s management style, while simultaneously taking some of the awe-factor away from Conte.
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