Republic of Ireland 1-0 Switzerland
By Jamie Moore @ The Aviva Stadium
Ireland’s first stop on the road to France ended with a 1-0 win over felloe Euro 2016 qualifiers Switzerland.
And for any of the 35,000 fans who were a minute or two late, the missed the winning goal.
It came in the second minute, Robbie Brady’s outswinging corner was headed towards goal by Shane Duffy, looked like it might have been blocked on the line by the Swiss man on the post, but up popped Aston Villa defender Ciaran Clark to head it in from close range.
Ireland may not have much of the ball in the games at Euro 2016, but with Robbie Brady’s deliveries, Martin O’Neill’s team have a great chance from set pieces.
Ireland’s missed some other good chances in what was a poor game, it the first half, Shane Long’s header from Seamus Coleman’s clipped cross smashed off the crossbar, he nodded the rebound into the arms of Yann Sommer.
And sub Eunan O’Kane saw his shot from outside the box fly just wide.
O’Kane was one of three debutants for Martin O’Neill’s team, Jonny Hayes also came on while Alan Judge started the game.
That’s the positives, the negative for Ireland is a serious leg injury to Kevin Doyle. He was taken off on a stretcher in the first half and went to hospital after a bad gash on his leg. Doyle tweeted and photo of the injury, he was having an operation on Friday night.
His replacement Darly Murphy also went off late in the game.
Republic of Ireland – Darren Randolph; Seamus Coleman, Shane Duffy, Ciaran Clark, Robbie Brady; Alan Judge, Stephen Quinn (James McCarthy, 61), David Meyler (Eunan O’Kane, 61), Aiden McGeady (Jonathon Hayes, 61); Shane Long (James McClean, 84), Kevin Doyle (Daryl Murphy,26 then replaced Wes Hoolahan, 79)
Switzerland – Yann Sommer; Michael Lang (Silvan Widmer, 82), Fabin Schar, Timm Klose, Richardo Rodriguez (J-Francois Moubandje, 78); Granit Xhaka, Blerim Dzemaili (Shani Tarasjaj, 72), Valon Behrami (Gelson Fernandes, 72); Breel Embolo, Haris Seferovic (Reato Steffan, 62), Addmir Mehmedi (Pajtim Kasami, 72)
We’ll have re-action to the game with former Ireland international Darren O’Dea on Now That’s What I Call Sport on Sunday from 9am, Darren will all look ahead to Tuesday night’s game against Slovakia.
