‘Not good enough’, insists Coleman

Somebody had to draw the short straw.

Somebody had to face the music even though it is played to the tune of some far from melodious questions put forward by a media corps squeezed into a marquee outside the front entrance of a stadium still ringed by straggling punters.

James McClean is the first to appear, but entreaties to share his thoughts fall on deaf ears. Seamus Coleman comes through next and stops for just under two minutes. A blink of an eye for the inquisitors. An eternity for a player digesting defeat.