Job done as Ireland formidable
I’m no mathematician but I reckon four goals means the job is just about 200% done.
On the biggest night in their football history, anything that could go wrong did go wrong for Estonia. But for Ireland the overwhelming sensation at the end was one of sheer joy. Far from facing an anxious night in Dublin on Tuesday, everyone associated with Irish football can now prepare for 90 minutes of celebration, secure in the knowledge that the 10-year wait to get back to international football’s top table is finally at an end.
And if the outcome of this play-off is now a foregone conclusion, so too is Giovanni Trapattoni’s position as the manager who will take Ireland back to the finals of the European Championships for the first time in 24 years.
An extraordinary game in Tallinn, which saw Estonia concede a penalty and have two men sent off, ended in the biggest competitive victory of Trapattoni’s reign, with Robbie Keane adding two goals to his record haul and Jon Walters scoring on his full competitive debut, after Keith Andrews, one of the Ireland’s most impressive players on the night, had got the show on the road with the all-important first goal.
True, the final scoreline might have masked the fact that Ireland laboured at times against exceedingly ordinary opposition but then we’ve come to expect that. What was novel and welcome, even given the exceptional circumstances of the game, was that Ireland ran out such comfortable winners on such a high-stakes night.
The meaning of it all — for the players, for the country and for the FAI’s finances — hardly needs to be stated. But you can be sure it will be converted into song and bellowed loud and clear in the Aviva on Tuesday.
The backdrop to last night’s game was wonderful. Irish sport might be synonymous with passion but in the compact and hugely atmospheric Coq Arena, it met its match in the massed choir’s spine-tingling rendition of the Estonian national anthem, a reminder that when Ireland was qualifying for its first European finals, Estonia was still edging towards independence. Little wonder, that seismic time is remembered in these parts as the ‘singing revolution’.
After declining to show his final hand until an hour before kick off, Giovanni Trapattoni went, as was widely expected, with Jon Walters ahead of Simon Cox in his starting 11. For a manager for whom habit is ingrained, this was a comparatively bold decision, since Walters had never previously played up front with Robbie Keane.
The thinking was that the Stoke man’s muscular presence, ability to hold up the ball under pressure and power in the air would help unlock an Estonian defence which, Trapattoni hoped, would prove vulnerable to early Irish pressure.
Walters, to his credit, did exactly what it said on the tin, though there was precious little to recommend itself to the neutral about the game’s early exchanges, with both sides guilty of nerves and sloppiness, the ball spending as much time in the air as it did on the ground. Against an Estonian team which was prepared to work and scrap as hard as Ireland ever do, the visitors were urgently in need of a touch of class.
And it was Aiden McGeady, always looking the most threatening of Ireland’s attackers, who showed the way when a scintilla of space finally opened up in the 13th minute. Fed by Robbie Keane, the Spartak Moscow man chipped a perfectly judged ball into the box where Keith Andrews, in an unusually advanced position, was able to supply the textbook downward header to the corner of the net.
The goal might have been improvised rather than the result of coherent pressure, but it was just what the manager had ordered.
The immediate worry now, however, was that Ireland would fall victim to a familiar malaise, that of not knowing whether to stick or twist when they’ve got their noses in front. Repeatedly we have seen Irish teams almost retreat from a position of strength, as if lacking the conviction that they are good enough to exploit their advantage. Ruthlessness has never been a component of the Irish football character.
Sure enough, Estonia upped their game and were briefly looking the more composed side when a major refereeing decision finally — two years on from Paris — went Ireland’s way in a play-off game. But it was hardly controversial, Hungarian referee Viktor Kassai left with no option after a dreadful defensive pass and a deft Robbie Keane nick sucked Andrei Stepanov into a crude challenge. Already on a yellow, the centre-half immediately saw red.
The mission for the second half was now crystal clear: Ireland had to exploit their man advantage, impose their superiority on game but limited opposition and get, at least, the second goal which would consolidate their position going into the second leg.
And with Duff and McGeady finally responding to Trapattoni’s urgent and animated touchline demands to come inside and shoot, Ireland did that and much more — albeit helped in no small measure by the inexperienced Estonians pressing the self-destruct button in spectacular fashion.
The second goal came in the 65th minute when McGeady got his shot away and, after the keeper could only parry, Keane lobbed the rebound to the far post where Walters crowned his full competitive debut with his first goal for his country.
The olés were still ringing, when Andrews’ free came back off the keeper’s legs and there was Keane again to claim number 52. It might have been one of the easiest he’s ever scored but its significance was touchingly obvious in the celebration he shared with fellow old campaigner Damien Duff.
An evening of deep disappointment for Estonia then turned to the stuff of nightmares when, again under pressure from the tireless Keane, skipper Raio Piiroja handled and, already on a yellow, found himself making the sad walk to the line.
Any further punishment after that for the nine men would have been of the cruel and unusual kind. But it duly came in the 87th minute when sub Stephen Hunt was bowled over in the box and Keane slotted home the penalty to make it four on the night and 53 in his international career.
Pity poor Estonia. They still have to wait until Tuesday to be put out of their misery. For Ireland, the celebrations have only just begun.
Subs for Ireland: S Hunt for Duff (73), K Fahey for Whelan (78), S Cox for Walters (83).
Subs for Estonia: V Voskoboinikov for J Ahjupera (54), J Lindpere for M Vunk (60), A Purje for T Kink (65).
