Quinn in confident mood
Louise believes Ireland are capable of qualifying
LOUISE QUINN has a worrying message for strikers around the globe: her best is yet to come!The 27-year old played a gargantuan role as the Republic of Ireland WNT recorded a historic 0-0 draw at the home of European champions the Netherlands which sees Ireland sitting pretty in second of their World Cup qualifying group with seven points from three games and not a goal conceded in that time.
Centre-half Quinn now believes that the girls in green are capable of qualifying for their first ever major international tournament but there is a lot of football to be played between now and summer in France in 2019.
But Quinn doesn’t believe the 0-0 draw was some kind of fluke, she says it was the just desserts for the monumental preparation that they undertook which lead to the climax of her career thus far.
“We know getting through a World Cup group is a massive challenge. It’s only the top team that will come out or only four of the best second placed teams out of all the groups (seven in total). We knew that we had to pick up points off these teams that are ranked above us so we were absolutely playing for a result. We were wanting and trying to win the game but there was a lot of pressure put on us so to hold out for the draw, we really were very, very happy.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been as prepared for a game. The amount of work that was put in both on and off the pitch (was incredible). There was one day where we did about three hours of analysis. We really, really worked extremely hard so I think it was a great result but it was all due to that work so that’s why we were so ecstatic.
“It’s by far the best result (in my career). As a defence, we were ridiculously proud of everyone. We put our bodies on the line and did everything we could to make sure that they didn’t score. There was a lot of blocks on the line but we cut out some of their main threats and we stopped some of their main players really, really well.”
Quinn and co. may be riding on a high at the moment, however they have to bide their time until their next qualifier when they host Slovakia and the Netherlands in a double-header in Tallaght in April. There may be 121 days until Slovakia arrive but Quinn expects they’ll be landing in Dublin airport before you know it and, spurred on by their stupendous stalemate, the sky is the limit for Colin Bell’s side now.
“It does seem pretty far away but it’ll come around so quickly. We’re lucky to have a couple of training camps before that as well. It’s going to be normal enough we’ll go about six weeks and then we’ll be back in camp again which really won’t be that long.
“We’re not sure yet which way we’ll approach it (the Netherlands match). We’ll have to assess and see what they might do but we’ll definitely be looking for something - hopefully three points but if we can get a point it’s still a really good result for us.
“If we can take points off the European champions then there’s no reason why we can’t take points from Norway as well. Our goal is to win the games and getting that result against the Netherlands shows that anything is possible.”
With Quinn now feeling at home at Arsenal, the Blessington native expects that a settled club-life will lead to further improvements on the pitch for herself.
“I think I’m tough on myself - I’ll always feel that I could have done this or that better. There’s still more to come of me. It’s been patchy with club football (which didn’t help). There’s still a lot more to come of me and especially when I get more game time regularly and hopefully I can bring it into the next few months which will be massive.”
Netherlands and Norway if you’re reading this - you’ve been warned.