Ireland U21s suffer early blow

Intl U21: Russia 2, Republic of Ireland 0

Two goals in the space of two minutes put an early dent in the Republic of Ireland’s hopes of reaching the 2004 Under-21 European Championship finals in Portugal.

Roman Pavluchenko opened the scoring at the Torpedo Stadium in the 28th minute when he fired into the roof of the net to give Ireland goalkeeper Joe Murphy no chance.

And a minute later Alan Kusov put the game out of reach for the Republic, doubling the home side’s lead after leaving the Irish defence for dead.