Ireland back on track in Nations League as they hammer Greece

Greece 0 Republic of Ireland 4 

The Republic of Ireland got back to winning ways in the UEFA Women’s Nations League by defeating Greece 4-0 at the Theodoros Vardinogiannis Stadium in Crete.

Marissa Sheva, Kryra Caursa, Jessie Stapleton and Amber Barrett were on target on a night that saw Cork’s own Denise O’Sullivan wear the captain’s armband.

This result puts the team back in contention for automatic promotion, with the Girls in Green sitting in second place in the group at the midway point of the campaign.

Carla Ward’s side were made to work for the points in Crete, as Greece came out and pinned Ireland into their own half.

Their problem was creating clear-cut chances, and it looked like one arrived in the 21st minute when a low cross was dropped onto the penalty spot. Courtney Brosnan stood her ground on that occasion and managed to stop Ioanna Papatheodorou from getting to the ball.

Ireland did get through the Greece line and cause problems for their hosts, their issue was putting together something meaningful.

Leanne Kiernan did the running, while players like Ruesha Littlejohn and Megan Campbell tried their luck, but nothing landed in a first half that seemed to grow more and more tense as half-time approached.

When the referee blew her whistle, Ward and her management team reacted by replacing Megan Campbell and Tyler Toland with Katie McCabe and Sheva.

The changes worked, with Ireland taking the lead just four minutes after the restart.

O’Sullivan made this happen by pouncing on a poor Greece clearance and keeping a drive alive on the edge of the area. The midfielder used the space to tee up Sheeva for a right-legged shot that went in via a deflection.

This injected a new lease of life into the Ireland team, who showed no signs of tiredness as the afternoon went on under the Mediterranean sun.

A corner followed, and McCabe’s setpiece failed to find a green and white jersey in the penalty area in the 51st minute.

Out of this momentum came the second goal on the hour mark. McCabe set this up with a cross in from the left and on-rushing Kiernan saw her shot pushed away by Zoi Nasi. Carusa was on hand to fire in, and her second goal of this edition of the Nations League made it 2-0 to Ireland.

Stapleton got the third in the 74th minute by turning in a McCabe corner at the near post.

Ward was finished there, the coach wanted more and that showed when Barrett swapped places with Carusa in the 78th minute.

The substitute capped off her 50th senior international appearance with a breakaway strike in added time that went beyond the reach of Nasi and into the opposite corner.

GREECE: Zoi Nasi; Maria Palama, Eleni Markou, Maria Gkouni; Stamatia Ntarzanou, Eleni Saich, Veatriki Sarri, Athanasia Moraitou, Maria Mitkou; Ioanna Papatheodorou, Anastasia Spyridonidou.

Subs: Anastasia Gkatsou for Gkouni (57); Maria Paterna for Ntarzanou (57), Ioanna Chamalidou for Markou (77).

IRELAND: Courtney Brosnan; Aoife Mannion, Jessie Stapleton, Anna Patten, Megan Campbell; Tyler Toland, Ruesha Littlejohn, Denise O'Sullivan (c); Lucy Quinn, Kyra Carusa, Leanne Kiernan.

Subs: Katie McCabe for Campbell (HT); Marissa Sheva for Toland (HT), Abbie Larkin for Kiernan (62), Amber Barrett for Carusa (78), Emily Murphy for Quinn (85).

Referee: Jelena Pejković (Croatia)