Republic of Ireland have once again failed to impress under new manager Martin O’Neill after getting only a 1-1 draw in the recent game against Scotland.
This was seen as an important match for the national team and its manager O’Neill. For a long period of time after his appointment, the former Aston Villa manager was unable to get any competitive action due to the presence of major international tournaments. Now, though, Ireland have an opportunity to be part of a major tournament themselves. The national team are involved in the Euro 2016 qualifying matches.
It has not progressed well so far after the Irish find themselves significantly below the qualification places after a string of poor results. Ireland have simply not been able to find the back of the net consistently in order to win matches. The team are two points behind Scotland, who occupy the final qualification spot, and even the Scots do not have a berth in Euro 2016 confirmed since the third placed team will have to go through the play-offs. O’Neill reckons that the intensity has been lacking from the team in recent games and the upcoming match against England will serve as a perfect recipe to kick up the players.
“It was exactly what we needed.In the last 15 minutes we looked pretty tired, but we started off brightly and maybe could have scored a couple of goals. We certainly had a couple of decent chances. But overall it was good for us and from a physical viewpoint it couldn’t have been better timed.Jon (Walters) was just feeling a little bit, but I think everybody’s okay.John O’Shea’s calf was tightening up on him, so I made a change there. It’s something he’s suffered a little bit from in the past,” said O’Neill.