TWO YEARS AGO last week, on November 9 2013 to be precise, Martin O’Neill addressed a packed function at The Gibson Hotel, where he left no ambiguity in terms of what was expected of him.
As the Derryman took to the stage, Ireland sat in their lowest ever position – 59th – in FIFA’s World rankings – but he was under no illusions.
“It is my remit to get the team to France,” he said.
“That is what I will be judged on.”
Ireland fell to an all-time low of 70 last summer, but last month’s 1-0 win over World champions Germany at Aviva Stadium aided not the climb to 42nd in the standings, but breathed new life into hopes of qualifying for Euro 2016.
On Friday night, Robbie Brady scored what could well prove the vital away goal against Bosnia and Herzegovina at the Bilino Polje stadium.
Edin Džeko leveled the tie three minutes later, leaving the play-off delicately poised ahead of a return leg this evening that will be played before a capacity crowd of 51,700 at Aviva Stadium.
Brady’s goal, in the dense Zenica fog, is precious, especially given the Republic of Ireland’s sometimes fractious history playing against teams from ‘Behind the Iron Curtain’
Many campaign’s hopes have been felled in Eastern Europe.
A trip to ‘The Bloc’ usually brings with it a cautious note.
There was a time when Ireland was a frequent visitor ‘behind the curtain’ for friendly fixtures.
In Paul Rowan’s book ‘The Team That Jack Built’, former Irish international Ray Treacy joked. “I got 43 caps for Ireland, probably about 40 of them playing against Poland.”
Treacy actually played nine times against the Poles at a time when meetings between the teams were a regular feature on the calendar. “We were always behind the iron curtain. We became the local team after a few years we were over there so often,” Alan Kelly senior once remarked.
The memories weren’t all good ones either. Ireland’s hopes of making the finals of Euro 92 were effectively crushed by Poland. Ireland led 3-1 in Poznan – goals by Paul McGrath, Andy Townsend and Tony Cascarino – but left with a 3-3 draw. It, and the scoreless draw in Dublin, meant Ireland would be left at home for the summer.
Most of the Polish trips were for friendlies, yet they weren’t so successful jaunts. Ireland got hammered 6-0 in Warsaw on their first visit in 1938, lost 3-1 in Krakow in 1964, having managed a two-all draw in Katowice four years earlier. In 1968, FAI Secretary Joe Wickham collapsed and died of a heart attack during a 1-0 reversal in Katowcice.
Ireland’s first taste of a win in Poland was when Don Givens’s netted twice in a 2-0 win in Poznan in 1978, but normality was restored soon as Poland won the meetings over there in 1978, ’81 and ’86.
Against the former USSR, Ireland do have some fond memories, not least Ronnie Whelan’s acrobatic goal in Hanover at Euro 88. Fifteen years earlier, USSR came to Dublin having reached the final of the Euro 72, but on a memorable night in Dalymount, Don Givens was the hat-trick hero in a 3-0 win that marked the beginning of the Irish career of Liam Brady.
Ireland didn’t fare too well against the old Czechoslovakia, though. They did win a European Qualifier 2-0 in Dublin in 1959, but were whacked 4-0 in the return game. Two years later, Andy Fogarty scored in Prague, but there was no reason for Irish cheer as the hosts coasted to a 7-1 win.
On Ireland’s eighth trip ‘Behind the Curtain’ in 1967, Ray Treacy and Turlough O’Connor gave Ireland a 2-1 win on a night when the Czechoslovakia needed only a draw from the round one qualifier to get to the quarter-finals.
Two years later, Ireland were defeated 3-0 in a World Cup qualifier in Prague, while the 2-1 friendly defeat of 13 years ago to the now Czech Republic in Olomouc is remembered for the debuts given to Robbie Keane, Damien Duff and Mark Kinsella.
More recently, Kilbane needed the only goal of the game in Dublin, but the Czechs were 1-0 winners in Prague.
It took Ireland until their fifth trip to Hungary before they recorded a win, with Kevin Sheedy and David Kelly on the mark in a 2-1 friendly win in Gyor.
The history in Bulgaria doesn’t make for good reading either with a World Cup qualifier defeat (2-1) in 1977 followed by European Qualifying defeats in 1979 (1-0) and 1987 (2-1)
For the 1977 game, Ireland were still in the hunt for a trip to the 1978 finals in Argentina, but the game descended into a farce with Don Givens having blatant penalty claims waved away and Frank Stapleton having a goal ruled out due to a ludicrous off-side decision.
There was a mass brawl in the second-half and referee Niklos Zlatonos cherry-picked four players to hand red cards to – they included Ireland’s Mick Martin and Noel Campbell.
That defeat and the subsequent 0-0 draw in Dublin ensured the Irish had a watching brief for the finals of 78.
If Ireland were lucky this week, then Jack Charlton’s team also had Irish eyes smiling on them in 1993 when Steve Staunton and Tony Cascarino scored to scramble Ireland to a 2-1 win in Albania – who
held Ireland scoreless in 2003 with that campaign also seeing an own goal by Aliaj required to give Ireland a 2-1 win at Lansdowne Road.
While Ireland’s well-documented history with Macedonia crushed hopes in the late 1990s, Ireland also suffered last-minute pain in 1999 when Davor Suker struck a late sucker punch to give his Croatia team a 1-0 win in Zagreb.
Ireland’s first trip to one of the former USSR states was a 2-0 win over Lativa in June 1993, John Aldridge and Paul McGrath netting in a 2-0 win in Riga. Aldridge has happy memories of playing against Latvia. In September ’92, he scored a hat-trick in a 4-0 win atLansdowne, while he was one the mark twice in a 3-0 win in Riga in 1994 and again scored twice in the 2-1 win in Dublin. Of Aldridge’s 19 Irish goals, 8 of them were against Latvia.
Against Lithuania, a week after their first game with Latvia, Ireland needed a goal from former manager Steve Staunton to earn a 1-0 win in Vilnius. In the qualifying group for the World Cup in 1998, Ireland finished just a point ahead of Lithuania – who held them scoreless in Dublin, with a Tony Cascarino brace earning a nervous 2-1 win away.
The meetings with Armenia in the Euro 2012 campaign are the only competitive qualifying meetings of the counties and in 2002 Ireland were also paired with Russia.
Gary Doherty and Clinton Morrison were the goalscorers in a 4-2 defeat in Moscow; Damien Duff the scorer in the 1-1 stalemate at Lansdowne.
On their way to the play-offs in the World Cup campaign that was ended by Thierry Henry in 2009, two 2-1 wins over Georgia (one of them played in Mainz, Germany, after UEFA ruled that Ireland wouldn’t be forced to travel to the war-torn state) were key.
Ireland knew all about Georgia’s hostility from 2003, however. During a 2-1 win in Tiblisi, Kevin Kilbane was struck on the arm by an open pen knife, glass from a broken vodka bottle became embedded on the pitch and missiles rained in on ‘keeper Shay Given.
“You expect a hostile atmosphere at these kind of places but I was really fortunate that the knife didn’t do any damage,” said Kilbane at the time.
The Irish were back in Tbilis last September when Aiden McGeady’s brilliant brace gave O’Neill a 2-1 win in his first competitive game as the Irish manager.
At the Boris Paichadze Dinamo Arena, Tornike Okriashvili’s strike cancelled out McGeady 24th-minute opener, but McGeady snatched a dramatic winner in injury time.
“A stroke of genius from a really gifted footballer,” was O’Neill’s reaction.
Ireland’s last play-off saw them record a 4-0 win over Estonia in Talinn on a night when Robbie Keane scored a brace while the subsequent 1-1 draw in Dublin was played amid a party atmosphere as the Irish headed for Euro 2012.
The history with Estonia had been straightforward before those meetings in 2011.
Mark Kinsella and Richard Dunne scored in a 2-0 win in Dublin, with Dunne and Matt Holland registering in a similar scoreline in Tallinn in their only two previous meetings.
The Republic of Ireland have only ever been at two European Championships before – Euro ’88 and Euro 2012. With England, Wales and Northern Ireland all on the plane to Paris next summer, O’Neill’s men don’t want to be left out.
They returned from behind the curtain with a more-than-credible draw on Friday night.
Now, the task for Martin O’Neill and his men is to finish the job he started that Saturday in the Gibson Hotel two years ago.
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