With the departure of former gaffer Stephen Kenny, the Republic of Ireland embarked on an eight month search for a new manager and back in early July, 57 year old former Iceland boss Heimir Hallgrímsson was named as his successor.
Irish Struggles Continue
It has been a difficult spell so far for him, as with the October international break coming to a close, he has now led the team in four Nations League B, Group 2 clashes but has suffered three defeats, picking up only one victory and the most recent loss to Greece was particularly difficult to take.
Liverpool stopper Caoimhin Kelleher was in inspired form in the first half of the game, pulling off a string of saves to keep the more dominant hosts out and on level terms, but an early goal in the second period opened the side up, and Kelleher ended the game with disappointment as an avoidable error allowed them to wrap the game up with a second goal.
With only three points on the board, and Greece and England taking the top two spots, we now face the prospect of a relegation play off tie even though we have two games remaining.
The biggest frustration was that the game could well have played out differently had Brighton and Hove Albion striker Evan Ferguson buried his early chance, as we had started brightly and could well have had the advantage after only four minutes and it would have been the perfect start for those fans using sports betting as they watched on from the comfort of their own living rooms.
The momentum could have changed after their opening goal as Ipswich Town midfielder Jack Taylor had two opportunities to tie the score up and help himself to a debut goal, but it was not to be. With four losses to Greece in the last 16 months, they have quickly become our latest bogey side.
Following the Athens based clash, plenty were quick to come to the defence of Kelleher for his mistake. This is because he had been so outstanding in the first half. Moreover, teammate Troy Parrott was very quick to point out that every player in the game makes a mistake at points, but Kelleher is even one of the more reliable on that front as he generally makes so few errors.
Naturally, he admitted that the result was a huge ‘frustration’ for everyone involved but that nobody was going to get bogged down or overly focus on that one error, as simply put the team had not done enough across the 90 minutes to take the victory that they had all desperately wanted. It is probably somewhat typical that their second goal came just as Ireland looked to be growing into the game again and had begun fashioning some decent chances of their own.
It is not quite back to the drawing board just yet, but Hallgrímsson will have been disappointed with the start that he has had in the role given the praise that he had first lavished on the players when taking the job on, but we are going to have to hope that things start clicking sooner rather than later and that we start getting more results we can cheer again.