STILL POSSIBLE

Despite failing to win both of their recent World Cup qualifying matches, the Republic of Ireland manager has said that he is confident that the team can qualify for the World Cup in Brazil. Giovanni Trapattoni has said that he believes that his team can still take advantage of the fact that other teams have not pulled away from them in the table. Despite managing draws from both the matches against Sweden and Austria, Ireland remain level on points with their competitors for the second place in the group. Germany continue to have a massive advantage at the top of the table leaving the rest of the teams to fight for the play-offs positions.

Several pundits have called for the Italian to resign after the poor showings in the recent World Cup qualifying matches. Trapattoni has just six months left on his contract, and he has said that he is confident about taking the team to the World Cup. He has said that the team was extremely unlucky not to take all three points from the match against Austria. He pointed to the chance from Shane Long that hit the post. Prior to the matches against Austria and Sweden, Trapattoni said that his team needed to take four points. However, they managed only two.

“There is a long way to go and we have the same possibility we had. This team can grow more in confidence and personality. Obviously I am not satisfied with this draw, but I have got to accept that we were missing a bit of experience. But we hit the post through Shane Long and the last goal was a deflection, so I can say we have been a little bit unlucky — a little bit, but not much,” said Trapattoni. Ireland’s next match will be a friendly against England.