France test awaits Irish after a sort of positive victory

THE moods during events at the Aviva this week were striking in their difference, despite having the same results.

The rugby chaps, even though going behind against England on Saturday, never once had us questioning our confidence that they would come back and claim the Grand Slam spoils, no matter what.

The soccer lads, on the other hand, managed to take an exciting early lead against Latvia, but deep down none of us were confident that they would comfortably see it home despite playing against a clearly inferior side. And so it played out.

But hey, let’s be positive and affirm Stephen Kenny and his players determination that they got the job done in the end, and a win is a win as they say. And a defeat heading into Monday’s Euro 2024 qualifier opener against the World Cup runner-up France would not have been the type of preparation required.

The positives

To be fair, there was a lot of positive to be taken from Wednesday victory against the Baltic nation. Firstly, Kenny had put out a side looking for match time rather than exhausted established players and these young men, especially in midfield, can be happy with their efforts on the night.

While Josh Cullen and Jason Knight may start against the French on Monday, so good was the performance of this makeshift centre that it will have raised questions in Kenny’s mind on the starting profile.

The man-of -the-match performance from Will Smallbone was revelatory, his ability to find the ball, turn with it, attack and then provide a telling pass was exciting and something we haven’t seen for a while in a green shirt. His partnership with Matt Doherty seemed to click early on and looked an exciting combination.

Callum Dowda did well on the left wing especially in the first half and completely wrong-footed the Latvian full-back when he ghosted in behind him to head home Ireland’s opener.

Jason Molumby worked his socks off and held the line well with some hard tackles, while he committed himself to every Irish attack.

In defence, Andrew Omobamidele stood out in a much weakened last line and did his chances of starting against France no harm. The experience of Cork’s John Egan was missed though, and the line didn’t really build any confidence until the Bishopstown man came into the action, on the hour mark.

Other positives on the night were Mikey Johnston. The man who played underage for Scotland made an immediate impact on his Irish debut with some hard running at the Latvian defence and the Celtic man looks an exciting prospect for the future.

Of course, Evan Ferguson grabbed most of the headlines for his scoring start to his Irish career and one should not discount the pressure he may have felt to perform, as the new wunderkind of Irish football.

The top off for the night, from the Cork point of view, was to see Chiedozie Ogbene come on and score the winner. It is always a delight to see his broad smile light up the evening as he got the reward his hard work merited.

The frailties

The unsettling things on the night include the gap in concentration that worryingly allowed Latvia back into the game.

After getting a dream start, the moment we took our foot off the pedal Latvia immediately punished us. Now Cork’s Caoimhin Kelleher may get some stick for not getting enough on the second deflected Latvian goal, he or any other keeper in the world could have done nothing against the thunder rocket from Roberts Uldrikis for the first. But the real fault for the goals fell to those in front of Kelleher, who either bumbled on the ball as in the entire defence for the second goal. Or got caught in possession like Matt Doherty for the first one.

Still replacements and lessons learned will hopefully prevent that from happening against France, whose quality will be hard enough to halt on its own, without gifting them possession in critical areas as well.

These frailties will play on our minds as fans which is why we cannot hold the same confidence that the rugby fans enjoy. Still we are not without hope.

Trouble in the camp

Rumours continue to circulate that there is trouble in the French camp over the captaincy. Then again, when is there never trouble in the French camp. Yet it will be interesting to see how they fared against the Dutch in last night’s Group B opener.

It is good time to face France now, as sides that usually do well in a tournament struggle to revive that momentum when they start the next slog of qualifiers.

If they are having difficulties with personalities within the camp or are suffering a World Cup hangover, who knows what we might do if the circumstances and atmosphere is right at the Avia.

Then again, they do have Mbappe, Griezmann, Giroud, et al, waiting to strike… ‘Gulp!’