Keane: how route one rescued valuable point

GOALSCORING hero Robbie Keane last night hailed the Republic of Ireland ‘character’, after Giovanni Trapattoni’s side rescued a point in the San Nicola Stadium.

Keane, who spent an unhappy spell in Italy with Inter Milan in 2000 when current Republic of Ireland assistant manager Marco Tardelli was in charge at the San Siro, equalised with three minutes to go when he swept home a Caleb Folan knockdown.

Afterwards Keane, who missed a golden opportunity to win the match in stoppage time, hailed Ireland’s effort and said they were unlucky not to win. He said: ‘‘They went down to 10 men and we conceded a sloppy goal which was disappointing, but sometimes when you’re playing 10 men, sometimes it’s harder.

‘‘Sometimes route one is always an option and that was the case when Caleb came on and that was where we got the goal from. I’m disappointed with my last chance, I probably should have got it on target, but I miskicked it a little bit.

‘‘When they went down to 10 men, we dominated with the extra man. We showed a lot of character to come back into the game and we’re obviously delighted. We bossed the game and they only had one chance. We had a few chances. We certainly deserved to win the game. But we have to be happy with a point, scoring in the last few minutes and, hopefully, that’s a little bit disheartening to them and we can carry on from here. The belief has always been there, we’ve shown that in the last five or six games. We’re still unbeaten, the same as them. Long may that continue.”

Man of the match Richard Dunne said: ‘‘We’re disappointed we’ve not won in the end. We feel we had enough chances to win the game. We came here believing we were as good as them and I think we’ve proved it. They settled a little bit better than we did (after the goal). The manager made a couple of tactical changes. it took a long time, but eventually it paid off. Caleb’s height really helped us. We completely dominated the game. We had to believe we’d get a chance. In the end, we got the goal, still unbeaten in the group and in an ideal position to qualify.”

Giovanni Trapattoni added: ‘‘The first goal complicated life on the pitch because Italian defenders are the best in the world. It was difficult to create opportunities. I believed until the last. I changed many situations until we achieved the goal. We deserved not to lose. We continue to hope to qualify.”