Shiels suffers shocker in opening Euro clash
NORTHERN Ireland’s desire to play attractive passing football under new manager Kenny Shiels contributed to their own downfall as their Women’s Euro 2021 campaign got off to the worst possible start.
Norwegian striker Caroline Graham Hansen netted a hattrick as the World Cup quarter-finalists won 6-0 at Seaview.
It was, however, the first goal from Guron Reiten which showed the positives and negatives of Shiels’ footballing philosophy.
Norway capitalised after just eight minutes. Captain Sarah McFadden received the ball just outside the box and with little on knocked it back to goalkeeper Jacqueline Burns, but she failed to get a touch on the ball as it rolled towards her, allowing Reiten to nip in and poke it home.
Disaster struck again for Northern Ireland just eight minutes later, Graham Hansen firing a low drive into the bottom corner.
In the second half Graham Hansen ghosted past Julie Nelson and Ashley Hutton on the left of the box to slot in a third on 63 minutes and she then completed her hat-trick, rolling the ball past Burns.
Substitute Amalie Eikeland completed the high five eight minutes from time.
Eikeland got her second just as the game entered injury time, tapping home from close range after Hansen’s ball in.
NORTHERN IRELAND: Burns, Newborough, Nelson, Hutton, Holdaway, McKenna (Wade 68 mins), McFadden (Montgomery 68 mins), Furness, McCarron, Vance (Callaghan, 68 mins), Magill. Subs: Higgins, Flaherty, Johnson, Holloway, Bell, White. NORWAY: Fiskerstrand, Mjelde, Thorisdottir, Wold, Boe Risa, Syrstad Engen (Eikeland, 71 mins), Minde, Saevik, Reiten (Thorsnes, 84 mins), Graham Hansen, Utland (Maanum, 71 mins). Subs: Bogstad, Hjelmseth, S Hansen, T Hansen,Veronika Kovarova (Czech Republic).
FOR two of the game’s biggest and most uncompromising competitors, in any capacity, Thursday night’s respective exploits represented both a watershed and a clear-eyed visualisation of the immediate future. Hope, reputation, a relative sense of glory and the kind of income that can enhance a squad.
Steven Gerrard and Neil Lennon both orchestrated the kind of results in Europe that go significantly beyond the prize of Europa League group stage football. This competition is, amongst others, serious business.
Rangers host Celtic in the Premiership’s first Old Firm derby of the season tomorrow with both clubs warming the reputation of Scottish football.
While both deal with headaches of Uefa charges for fan misbehaviour and sectarianism — a whole, taxing, separate subject matter entirely — on the pitch at least players have impressed while finding what already appears to be an apparent continental niche, at last.
As one of the world’s great footballing cities, Glasgow will come into its own once again throughout the autumn, with Young Boys, Porto and Feyenoord arriving at Ibrox, while Celtic face recent foes Cluj, plus Rennes and Lazio.
Shouldering the judgments as always, Lennon knows this terrain only too well as both Celtic player and manager for a second spell.
His delight after AIK Stockholm were dismantled 4-1 in Sweden confirmed just how pleased he is that the Parkhead side have rediscovered their verve so soon after the self-destruction this month at home to Cluj; as grisly and infamous a Champions League episode in the club’s recent history.
Still, Celtic’s performance on Thursday also proved to many that here we have a Scottish side prepared to go to a tricky arena and play with confidence and lightness of touch, exemplified with the combination of Odsonne Edouard and James Forrest setting them apart.
How important will the memories of Stockholm be when Celtic take flight again in the hope of extracting valuable points against, say, Lazio in Rome? They have, on the face of it at least, an easier group task than Rangers. The feel-good factor enveloping both Glasgow giants as they woke to embrace yesterday’s Uefa draw imbues the derby clash with extra sizzle, if that’s even possible.
Rangers boss Gerrard was — despite choosing his words in the raucous aftermath of a late Alfredo Morelos winner to see off Legia Warsaw — emotional. Drained, but downright relieved.
The threat posed by Legia hovered for days across Gerrard’s conscience, where defeat for Rangers would have scribbled a gloomy texture not only in respect of tomorrow but for a sizeable chunk of this season in addition to reducing the club’s