Euro 2012 C'mon Ireland

[elfan]

Come everyone lets get this started . Get behind Ireland tonight. COYBIG

[nelly the elephant]

Come everyone lets get this started . Get behind Ireland tonight. COYBIG

Yep.....it's been a thoroughly depressing sporting weekend for me with Ireland losing twice in the rugby and Wicklow beaten in the Christy Ring yesterday.....hopefully Trap and the lads can pull it out of the fire tonight.

[yellabelly1961]

Come everyone lets get this started . Get behind Ireland tonight. COYBIG

Yep.....it's been a thoroughly depressing sporting weekend for me with Ireland losing twice in the rugby and Wicklow beaten in the Christy Ring yesterday.....hopefully Trap and the lads can pull it out of the fire tonight.

And hopefully Wexford beat Longford in the replay and Rafa wins the French ( not because he's my favourite player but because I Nole beat Federer, my all time favourite)

[suisse]

Good luck to the teams and all the fans over there too. Game is on at 4:45am here. Not enough of a football to wake up and see it with a long week ahead. Hoping for good FB news when I wake up.

[nelly the elephant]

Good luck to the teams and all the fans over there too. Game is on at 4:45am here. Not enough of a football to wake up and see it with a long week ahead. Hoping for good FB news when I wake up.

Your lot just drew with Carlow btw.....

[Cianostays]

Blood, sweat but hopefully no tears required from the boys tonight. Hope they can produce something special.

Come on Ireland.

[Peg Leg]

Jesus, its frustrating to see 2 goals like that getting passed us! COYBIG

[Cianostays]

Roll on Spain

[suisse]

Good luck to the teams and all the fans over there too. Game is on at 4:45am here. Not enough of a football to wake up and see it with a long week ahead. Hoping for good FB news when I wake up.

Your lot just drew with Carlow btw.....

The good news I was hoping for.

How's the national optimism now?

[Degz]

Thoroughly depressing sporting weekend.

[Sauvignon Blank]

Thoroughly depressing sporting weekend.

About sums it up. Awful in both games.

[jezzer]

Playing not to lose. The Irish disease. Pathetic.

[Sauvignon Blank]

Playing not to lose. The Irish disease. Pathetic.

Can't fault the players in both cases. Bad luck,shoite refereeing and soft goals. Kidney, we've done to death but Trap last night should be done for dereliction of duty. Our midfield was completely overran from 20mins onwards and he allowed it deteriorate.

Suicidal letting the Croats have a stroll in midfield and dictate play. Our midfield needs changing and fast. McLean should start against the Spaniards but he won't. Trap will set us out for another draw and we'll duly get taken apart.

[jezzer]

Don't disagree with any of that Blank. Though a few players looked very nervy and uncomposed, compared with the Croats who looked like a team taking advantage of the world stage to show the fans what they can do.

O'Shea, Keane and Whelan in particular looked very shaky. The only Irish player who for me played to a standard with positivity and composure was St. Ledger.

Our midfield is a joke and our strikeforce is anything but balanced, whatever the pundits say. Our rigid 4-4-2 formation is prehistoric.

[Apocrypha]

Don't disagree with any of that Blank. Though a few players looked very nervy and uncomposed, compared with the Croats who looked like a team taking advantage of the world stage to show the fans what they can do.

O'Shea, Keane and Whelan in particular looked very shaky. The only Irish player who for me played to a standard with positivity and composure was St. Ledger.

Our midfield is a joke and our strikeforce is anything but balanced, whatever the pundits say. Our rigid 4-4-2 formation is prehistoric.

The Irish Football team are a disgrace, at least the Rugby boys gave it a lash before getting manshamed to fcuk.

Inspiration for Spain?

Where's Uday Hussein when you need him?

[fourthirtythree]

No Apocrypha, you have it wrong: as per Kidney's pathetic excuses our soccer team come from unsuccessful clubs that don't challenge in European competition. Therefore they are better prepared for international level. Simples.

Everything is grand.

Let's face up to the fact that the soccer team is there making up the numbers, it was lucky to get there, there's barely a player who would get into the '88, '90, '94, '02 teams. The best players are past it, the rest are mediocre journeymen. I hope they give it a lash. Kenny Cunningham's approach on the telly last night sounded promising (but it did involve dropping Keane...)

[tackle-bag]

The funny thing is that we're probably going to qualify for the majority of European Championships from now onwards. A lot of people, who have been talking about how we need to treasure a rare appearance at this level, have forgotten that the number of teams in the tournament is increasing by 50% from 16 to 24 with effect from 2016 onwards.

There were 53 countries seeking qualification for Euro 2012 and there will probably be an identical number next time around. However, you can effectively discount the bottom two pots which contain 14 teams like San Marino, the Faroe Islands and Malta. As such, we only really need to worry about being in the top 24 of 40 teams, which can probably be achieved by edging out the likes of Wales, Hungary, Cyprus and Belarus.

In other words, there's no need to be distraught if we don't perform well with a fairly sh!te team in the current competition, because we should be back with a new crop in 4 years' time. It certainly won't be another 24 years.

[Broken Wing]

The Greek fans are singing like their winning. I'd remind them that they're 2-1 down.

What a dick.

[Broken Wing]

There were 53 countries seeking qualification for Euro 2012 and there will probably be an identical number next time around. However, you can effectively discount the bottom two pots which contain 14 teams like San Marino, the Faroe Islands and Malta. As such, we only really need to worry about being in the top 24 of 40 teams, which can probably be achieved by edging out the likes of Wales, Hungary, Cyprus and Belarus.

Ignoring the two spots allocated to the hosts there were 14 up for grabs. The top 12 ranked teams in Europe took 12 of them. The remaining two went to Denmark and us. We were the lowest ranked non-host team in the tournament at the time of the draw.

FIFA rankings as of 6/6/12 - worth noting that Poland and Ukraine are both suffering from having two years without a compeitive game due to qualifying as hosts.
Country/FIFA/UEFA
Spain/1/1
Germany/3/2
Netherlands/4/3
England/6/4
Croatia/8/5
Denmark/9/6
Portugal/10/7
Italy/12/8
Russia/13/9
France/14/10
Greece/15/11
Sweden/17/12
Republic of Ireland/18/13
Czech Republic/27/16
Ukraine/52/28
Poland /62/32

[Lar]

There were 53 countries seeking qualification for Euro 2012 and there will probably be an identical number next time around. However, you can effectively discount the bottom two pots which contain 14 teams like San Marino, the Faroe Islands and Malta. As such, we only really need to worry about being in the top 24 of 40 teams, which can probably be achieved by edging out the likes of Wales, Hungary, Cyprus and Belarus.

Ignoring the two spots allocated to the hosts there were 14 up for grabs. The top 12 ranked teams in Europe took 12 of them. The remaining two went to Denmark and us. We were the lowest ranked non-host team in the tournament at the time of the draw.

FIFA rankings as of 6/6/12 - worth noting that Poland and Ukraine are both suffering from having two years without a compeitive game due to qualifying as hosts.
Country/FIFA/UEFA
Spain/1/1
Germany/3/2
Netherlands/4/3
England/6/4
Croatia/8/5
Denmark/9/6
Portugal/10/7
Italy/12/8
Russia/13/9
France/14/10
Greece/15/11
Sweden/17/12
Republic of Ireland/18/13
Czech Republic/27/16
Ukraine/52/28
Poland /62/32

Don't understand. Denmark 6th in Europe. Did you mean Czech Republic? You could just as easily have said the top 13 ranked sides in Europe qualified with the remaining place going to the Czech Republic. If we are ranked 13th in Europe then we have a rightful place in a competition for the best 16.