King upbeat despite Turkish defeat

IRELAND U21 boss Noel King is adamant his side are still in the mix for reaching the 2013 European Championships after watching them suffer a first competitive loss under his reign in Manisa.

Trailing to a sloppy 10th minute opener, Ireland still mustered a brave effort in their quest to salvage a result, which would have boosted their qualification hopes on the back of last Thursday’s victory over Hungary in their opener.

A lofted ball from Turkey full-back Kamil Çörekçi into the inside-right channel was poorly defended, allowing the alert Sahin Aygünes to take full advantage by rounding the Ireland goalkeeper Ian McLoughlin and tucking home from an acute angle.

It was the first time King has lost a qualifier since taking charge of the U21s 13 months ago but he remains upbeat.

“It’s still very much possible to qualify,” said King. “We’ve only played two matches so far and with improvement in certain areas, we’ll be well in the reckoning.

“We’ve come here to play the team I think started the group as favourites and we’re leaving disappointed not to have got a point.”

“I thought our spirit in searching for an equaliser was fantastic and we’ll have no fears when we host them in Ireland next year in the reverse fixture.”

Ireland had chances to equalise. King had lost his match-winner Rhys Murphy to a hamstring strain on Sunday and that situation worsened before kick-off with Preston’s Adam Barton falling ill.

Ireland showed signs of fluency on 20 minutes when Robbie Brady linked up with the duo to release Jeff Hendrick through the middle. Only a last-ditch tackle from Aziz denied him a route to goal.

Ten minutes later, Brady had a decent penalty claim denied when he was sent sprawling by Musa Nizam.

Nevertheless, Ireland were also prone to a counter-attack by their slick hosts and captain Rob Kiernan had to stand tall six yards out to snuff out a marauding surge into the box by Alper Potuk four minutes before the break.

Shane Duffy was thrust into an unorthodox striker’s role as a substitute 15 minutes from the end and met a cross from Brady 10 minutes from the end only to find his header hacked off the line.

Italy hammered Hungary 3-0 in the other group game played last night.

IRELAND: McLoughlin (MK Dons); Oyebanjo (York City), Canavan (Scunthorpe), Kiernan (Wigan), Gunning (Dundee United); Towell (Hibernian), Connolly (Bolton), Clifford (Chelsea), White (Leeds); Hendrick (Derby); Brady (Hull).

Subs: Collins (Shrewsbury) for Hendrick (66 mins), Duffy (Scunthorpe) for Oyebanjo (75 mins), Hourihane (Plymouth) for Towell (80 mins)

TURKEY: Karabulut; Çörekçi, Aziz, Basdas, Nizam; Kaplan, Gülle, Demir, Uysal, Çolak; Aygünes.

Subs: Yilmaz for Kaplan (70 mins), Uludag (for Çolak (85 mins), Ozmen for Basdas, (90+2).

Referee: P Massoleni (ITA).