Garvan rescues point for Irish

OWEN GARVAN played a captain’s role by popping up four minutes into injury-time to seal a precious point for the Irish under-21 team against Switzerland at the RSC last night.

Just as hopes had begun to fade of an equaliser emerging to substitute Fabien Frei’s 58th minute opener, Garvan arrived on cue to smash home following good work by Keith Treacy and Alan Judge.

After being held to disappointing draws against Georgia and Estonia in their previous two fixtures, the Irish were thrilled to get something out of this tie.

Switzerland remain top of the group on 10 points while the Irish now have three points from their opening four fixtures.

But while poor finishing cost them before now, Don Givens’s youngsters showed real character to secure a share of the spoils.

Swiss keeper Yann Sommer was the first to be tested in the second minute when he dived to parry a Cillian Sheridan strike.

A free-kick fired in by Daniel Pavlovic in the seventh minute tested Irish keeper Shane Redmond, who held on comfortably.

Sheridan came close to intercepting a poor back-pass by Gaetano Breradi four minutes later, Sommer half-cleared as far as James McCarthy but his long range effort drifted wide.

Redmond produced a remarkable stop in the 17th minute to keep out a close range header from Mario Gavranovic following a free-kick swung over by Pavlovic.

Switzerland though they had scored in the 22nd minute but Alessandro Ciarocchi’s strike was cancelled out for hand-ball and he was booked for dissent. Replays suggested the officials had been incorrect.

Seven minutes before half-time O’Shea had a chance when he cut in from the left but Sommer got down well to hold his strike.

Substitute Frei opened the scoring in the 58th minute after tapping home from close range from a Ciarocchi cut-back after a strike by Valentin Stocker struck the base of Redmond’s right post.

Less than a minute later Alan Judge was denied an equaliser when Sommer pushed his powerful strike wide.

Sheridan was denied an equaliser in the 87th minute when his header from a Judge cross was spectacularly tipped over.

REP OF IRELAND: Redmond; Coleman, Hughton, Conneely, Morris, Davies, Judge, Garvan, Sheridan, McCarthy, O’Shea. Subs: Treacy for O’Shea 59 mins; Clifford for Davies 59; Collins for Conneely 83.

SWITZERLAND: Sommer; Berardi, Rossini, Affolter, Koch, F Feltscher, Hochstrasser, Pavlovic, Stocker, Ciarocchi, Gavranovic. Subs: Frei for Gavranovic 46; Nikci for Stocker 68; R Feltscher for F Feltscher 80.

Referee: A Perez Burrull (Spain)