Now, we’re relying on our rivals to make errors
THE disappointment from last night will not go away for a long time, because there is a simple fact facing Ireland now: our fate is out of our hands. We are now depending on the results of other games. Had we beaten Austria last night, had we held on for 30 seconds and got that precious win, we would have kept the pressure on Sweden and the Austrians. Now, though, we are depending on others and that is never a good place to be. If Sweden win their game in hand on us they have a huge advantage. Now, we need to beat Sweden at home, we need to beat Austria away, and we may need to get a result in Germany. If we had won last night we were clear of our visitors; we would have put daylight between ourselves and our main rivals for second spot — and the pressure would be on them. Now we’re up against it. If you want to qualify for major tournaments you need to win big games, so having to go to Austria and Germany and get points is the requirement. What is frustrating though is that we made life hard for ourselves when it could have been simpler. A huge chance went a-begging at Aviva Stadium. Austria didn’t have too many clear opportunities, but these games are decided on fine margins. Now, all of a sudden, Group C has changed totally. Shane Long was excellent for Ireland and taking him off was a mistake. He was our best player on the night and he should have finished the game. It is natural for a team defending a lead to drop back as the minutes tick down but instead of taking off Long, replacing Conor Sammon with a link player like Wes Hoolahan or Simon Cox would have worked better. It would have helped out the two central midfielders and taken some of the pressure off them and also off the defence. Instead, Giovanni Trapattoni tried to keep things compact. It didn’t work and now our destiny is out of our hands.
@kdkilbane77