Ireland target top-flight return

Ireland 4 Russia 1

In sweltering conditions, the Irish easily saw off the pool’s whipping boys and now face a semi-final tomorrow against Pool B runners-up Austria. Wales finished second in Pool A after beating Belarus and play the Czech Republic in the other semi-final.

Three Stephen Butler goals, and a Mark Gleghorne penalty corner secured victory for the Irish but it took a “severe bollocking” at half-time from coach Dave Passmore to fire the Irish into top gear. Vice-captain Jason Black admitted afterwards that the Irish had played very poorly in the opening period and the performance had not impressed the coach.

“We got a severe bollocking at half-time and I suppose that was what we needed.

Sometimes when you have a poor start, you need a kick up the behind to get you going and that’s exactly what happened.”

Ireland did most of the pressing in the initial stages of the game, but lacked a good first touch up front and much of their good work in the other two thirds of the pitch was being wasted. It should have been better against an outfit who effectively had nothing to play for, but it was 23 minutes before Ireland’s first clear-cut chance arrived, by virtue of a short corner.

Butler rattled into the Russian net.

They did not press home the advantage for the remainder of the half and nearly gave the Russians a glimmer of hope by conceding two short corners, the first of which was well saved by Nigel Henderson in the Irish goal and the second blocked by a speedy Jason Black.

One up at half-time then, and the coach’s displeasure had an immediate effect because the Irish came out of the traps in much more lively fashion in the second period, doubling their lead within a minute.

Some excellent work by Andy Barbour left the Russians with no option but to foul him and Ireland were awarded a second penalty corner, Butler again stepping up to the plate in a confident manner to hammer home his second.

Butler then retired to the bench for a little while and in his absence Mark Gleghorne took over the short-corner duties and he converted one after himself being fouled in the 46th minute.

Gleghorne and Gordon Elliot went close but the Russians were proving more testing than they were supposed to. While the Irish could not extend the lead Russian substitute Pavel Plesetskiy rattled home an excellent if unexpected 63rd minute goal from play.

At 3-1 the Irish were not going to lose the game or their grip on the Pool A lead and once they got their passing game together they were comfortable, even though they had an excellent Barbour goal disallowed for a foot foul in the 67th minute after a great passing move involving Paddy Brown, Iain Lewers and Mark Irwin.

However, they wrapped things up with a Butler penalty after Mark Black was fouled with just two minutes to go.

“We’ve had better first halves,” Passmore said, “but it’s always good when you have played poorly to come back in the second half with a really up-tempo performance. Our aim throughout this tournament was to keep improving in every game and while we did not show that early on in this game, we certainly did in the second period.”

The coach, admitting for the first time that Ireland had come into this tournament as favourites, said: “Our initial aim was to top the pool and we’ve done that. But the real aim coming here was to win the thing and we have yet to achieve that. We’re still on track but we’ll have to fulfil our goal of continuous improvement through each of the games if we’re to do so.

“Even so, we’re confident in our own ability and keeping up momentum. We will have to see if we can do that.”

Butler’s hat-trick marked his 50th international score, not a bad ratio from 82 caps. More of the same will be required tomorrow.

IRELAND: N. Henderson, P. Brown (C), J. Black, D. Smyth, S. Butler, K. Burns, M. Irwin, M. Raphael, J. Sherriff, G. Shaw, M. Black. Rolling Subs: G. Elliot, D. Hobbs, A. Barbour, M. Gleghorne, I. Lewers.

RUSSIA: R. Rogov, I. Ivanov, Y. Safanov, S. Chekalin, A. Platonov, I. Garifzyanov, M. Lyutikov, T. Nikolaev, A. Gevorkyan, S. Gevorkyan, G. Arakelyan. Rolling Subs: I. Dobizine, T. Shatski, R. Nasyrov, P. Plesetskiy.