O’Neill on shaky ground unless performance can dig him out of hole
HERE in Europe’s poorest country with the continent’s lowest life expectancy, Martin O’Neill must fear seeing yet another year shaved off his own longevity when his stuttering Republic of Ireland side face Moldova this evening.
O’Neill endured a torturous first 45 minutes against Georgia in Dublin on Thursday night, the worst performance of his threeyear reign.
Had captain Seamus Coleman not rescued what appeared an unlikely victory, Ireland’s hopes of making it to the World Cup finals in Russia in 2018 would have been on shaky ground, even at this early stage in the qualifying process.
The Moldovan capital of Chisinau rests on a geological fault-line and has twice been devastated by earthquakes in the past 80 years. Failure by Ireland to win at the Zimbru Stadium tonight and O’Neill will feel a seismic shock himself. And, while he knows that victory is the only option, O’Neill is braced for another rocky ride.
‘We’re not the type of team that is going to wipe the floor with people, we have to fight for everything,’ he said.
‘We know that ourselves and this will be a big test again for us.’
Asked whether his side reserves its best performances for the likes of football giants Germany and Italy but struggles for inspiration against lowerranked teams, O’Neill said: ‘It’s not a case of raising ourselves against the best opposition. Everybody goes through these periods.
‘Even Portugal won Euro 2016, then went out and lost to Switzerland. Things like this happen.’
O’Neill tore into his players during the interval at the Aviva Stadium before Coleman forced the only goal early in the second half, his score the equivalent of going in under the rugby posts after a driving run along the by-line and a tap-in from half a yard.
‘I think what’s lost in this is that we actually won the game against Georgia, albeit with a piece of brilliance from Seamus,’ the manager added.
‘We have to try to raise ourselves again for this. It’s a big game for us and obviously the result is the most important thing.
‘We can play better, we know that — we did this in France. It’s only a couple of months since we played brilliantly against Sweden and brilliantly against Italy,
beating Italy — and we should have beaten Sweden.’
Ireland met the hosts France in the last 16 at Euro 2016.
‘France were extremely concerned about us for a long period,’ O’Neill said.
After a World Cup qualifying group draw in Serbia — ‘a top-class team’, O’Neill said — and this week’s win, the Republic seem on course following the first two games of their campaign.
Ireland were never going to waltz through qualifying, winning admirers for freeflowing football. Indeed, the win against Georgia was ugly in the extreme.
And so it might have to be here, especially as creative sparks Robbie Brady (who has concussion) and Jeff Hendrick (who is suspended) are absent.
There is a crumbling and unsightly Soviet-style tower block staring down on this exposed 10,000capacity stadium. It is not pretty, and that’s the way it might have to be for O’Neill and his limited side. Probable Ireland XI: Randolph; Coleman, Clark, Duffy, Ward; McCarthy, Whelan; Walters, Hoolahan, McClean; Long.