IRISH FACE BATTLE WITH BOSNIA TO MAKE FINALS

THE reward for the Republic of Ireland in pipping Scotland to third place in Group D is a tricky play-off duel against Bosnia & Herzogovina. Martin O’Neill’s men have a string of injuries and suspensions to contend with, as well as an in-form Bosnian outfit who won their final three group games, to reach France 2016. The Republic have met Bosnia just once before, with the Irish winning 1-0 courtesy of a Shane Long header in May 2012 under previous manager Giovanni Trapattoni. Long is currently sidelined with an ankle injury but with almost a month before the twolegged play-off, which will see the Republic play away first on November 13 with the return leg at the Aviva Stadium just three days later, O’Neill knows there is the potential for more setbacks. ‘I spoke to Shane a few days ago and he is optimistic,’ he told SkySportsNews. ‘Like anything else, sometimes with these particular injuries you are going well for a little while, and then you have three, four or five days where the injury doesn’t seem to be healing up as quickly as you would imagine, so we’ll have to play it by ear. ‘We’ve obviously got a few problems to negotiate, we’ve got a couple of suspensions (Jon Walters and John O’Shea) and who knows what might happen in the next couple of weeks with players playing at club level. ‘Injuries are always a possibility but whatever we have when the time comes we will go for it. We will give it absolutely everything we have got in our bid to get to France.’ Ireland were not seeded for the draw but avoided the likes of Sweden and Denmark, who will face each other in a Scandinavian derby. And O’Neill believes they can take encouragement from the four points they earned from two matches against Germany in their group games. ‘Those were terrific results for us,’ he said. ‘The late equaliser out in Germany was fantastic considering they were just back a couple of months from winning the World Cup.’ The other two play-off matches see Ukraine take on Slovenia and Norway face Hungary.