Disappointed Coleman focuses on Italy

A win, a draw and two defeats. Not the greatest of starts to the bright new era, then.

Only Steve Staunton endured a worse opening quartet of results as Republic of Ireland boss in the 30 or so years since Big Jack took over the boys in green in 1986.

And we all know how that ended.

Still, we know too that this doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. The 30 minutes after half-time last night ranked alongside the most unabsorbing seen at the Aviva Stadium, and God knows the new Lansdowne Road has seen its fair share of turkeys.

Martin O’Neill cut a positive enough figure once the guns fell silent after this latest phoney war. His players vacillated between the plus points and those of a less comforting variety as attention turns to Italy at Craven Cottage next week.

“Disappointing,” admitted Seamus Coleman. “You’d obviously like to win the game but that wasn’t to be. They got the second goal which gave us a lot to do, but to be fair, big Jonny (Walters) came on and took his goal well. It just wasn’t to be tonight.”

Coleman was among a troupe of players who emerged from the dressing room afterwards to lament the loss while, at the same, talk positively about the volume of possession enjoyed and some of the fare put together with the ball.

Evenings can come and go on days like this without an Irish team threatening the visiting goal to any great degree but this wasn’t one of them. Turkey led a charmed life at times but Ireland’s lack of a killer instinct was disappointing, too.

Thoughts turned frequently to Robbie Keane in Los Angeles.

“We should be scoring them chances,” Coleman admitted. “The lads realise those kind of chances... we should be putting them away. Hopefully in the next couple of games we can do that.

“This is our first game together, first game of the summer, so we will be looking to improve on that. As I said, I thought we played well at times. It is never nice to concede two goals but I thought we had a lot of chances in the first half.”

Among the more positive performances was that of Wes Hoolahan. Man of the match? Probably not, but he was decent nonetheless. It was the Norwich man’s long ball that put Walters through for Ireland’s goal.

Turkey limited his space of operations but the diminutive Dubliner continues to show a tigerish ability to hold onto a ball when challenged or, on occasions when it is lost, to win it back. “Different class,” was Coleman’s verdict.

Hoolahan’s own verdict on proceedings? “We lost the game, that’s the really disappointing thing about it. If we win the game, you might think you played better and we played better as a team. It’s a results business. We need to win.”

Hoolahan is playing for more than just his country right now after a season spent largely on the sidelines at Carrow Road but he refused to be drawn on his club future, stating only that he has one year still to go on his contract in Norfolk.

Like Walters after him, Hoolahan bemoaned the failure of French referee Ruddy Buquet to award a penalty and show a red card to Omer Toprack after six minutes when the defender tangled with Shane Long in the visitors’ penalty area.

Replays suggested any illegal contact was debatable, condemning the moment then to an opportunity lost by Ireland rather than one thieved by foul means. And, like Coleman, Hoolahan accepted as much.

“I know. If you play a top team and don’t take your chances, you’ll be punished. If you keep playing the way we’re playing, passing the ball and moving it, we’ll get the goals and go on to win games more often than not.

“It would be a worry if we weren’t creating chances, if we weren’t keeping hold of the ball, or if it looked like we were struggling. They had two chances and they scored from the two of them. That sums it up, really.”

Coventry City goalkeeper Joe Murphy has been called up to join the squad this week.