Players look on the bright side

THE Republic of Ireland’s players were putting on a collective brave face yesterday after the draw for the finals pitted the Boys in Green against world and European champions Spain, Italy and Croatia.

“Easy draw,’’ quipped midfielder Keith Andrews before adding more seriously, “there’s no denying it’s a tough draw. We said beforehand,

privately, if we got one of the host nations — even though they’d have had home advantage — we’d take one of those.