Excellent first half for the Irish, expect a French onslaught in the 2nd half but you're halfway there...
Can we catch them on the break and deliver a sucker punch? I think we have them rattled. Just hope we can hang on.
Plenty of time, but have the Irish got the legs and guile? With 10 men? Big ask, but the French look very unconvincing to me.
Ireland are functional but not very creative. Teams like France should be tearing us apart with the quality they have. Truth be told they could have had 4 or 5 in the second half. It wouldn't have flattered them. We created almost nothing the entire match. There are plenty of positives to be taken however. Lots of young players who are prepared to work hard for the team. We will be functional in the coming World Cup qualifiers and lots of teams won't fancy playing us.
Commiserations to Ireland who gave it a good go and unfortunately ran out of steam. Once they went down to 10 men the writing was on the wall. As with Northern Ireland, heads can be held high.
Germany take 7 minutes to score against Slovakia, have missed a penalty and look like they could score at will. Ominous. Time for England to get their scoring boots on.
Indeed! It looks to me that Slovakia are more open than they were against England, but I'm sure that's just down to the quality of the Germans.
When they haven't got the ball Slovakia are sitting incredibly deep for a team which needs to score, Boateng is virtually playing in midfield, but they may be getting a few more players forward on the rare occasions they have possession. Small positive I don't think the German defence has been put under any real pressure in this tournament and I don't think they are as good as they were in the World Cup. Italy or Spain may find them out in the quarters (what a daft draw this has worked out as).
England and Spain not winning their groups has made it very lopsided. The other side of the draw is wide open, especially with Croatia gone.
