Ireland U-21s struggle to find killer instinct against Qatar in final dress rehearsal for Euro 2027 qualifiers
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The 42
an hour ago
- The 42
Shelbourne set for €3.8 million European tie
SHELBOURNE ARE set for one of their biggest games of the season on Wednesday evening. The Dublin side face reigning Croatian champions HNK Rijeka (kick-off: 7.45pm — live on Solid Sport), who are at home for the first leg of the Europa League third qualifying round clash. Winning the tie would guarantee a minimum of €3.8 million in prize money, and at worst, a place in the league phase of the Uefa Conference League. But Shels manager, Joey O'Brien, believes their opponents are favourites to progress to the play-off round to play either Greek side PAOK or Wolfsberger of Austria. 'It's going to be a really difficult game, but it's a game we can't wait for, we're really looking forward to,' O'Brien says. While a draw would be perceived as a positive result for the Irish side ahead of next week's home leg in Tolka, O'Brien insists his team will aim to win on the night and not be tempted to adopt an overly defensive approach. 'If you have a game plan of just sitting in and trying to survive for 90 minutes, I don't think it works like that,' he adds. Hot and humid conditions are expected at the Stadion Rujevica, which has a capacity of just over 8,000. Advertisement Shelbourne will be without defender Tyreke Wilson and ex-Arsenal youngster Jack Henry-Francis, though goalkeeper Conor Kearns could return quicker than expected from a hamstring injury, while Milan Mbeng and Sean Moore, recently signed from Cork City and West Ham respectively, are both available. The Croatian side's squad contains several international players, and O'Brien believes they were 'unlucky' to get knocked out of the Champions League qualifiers and looked 'the better team' over two legs. After a 0-0 draw at home, they lost 3-1 after extra time to the Bulgarian side, Ludogorets, with the 77th and 98th minute dismissals of former Croatia underage internationals Gabriel Rukavina and Toni Fruk significant factors in the defeat. Rijeka, who won the double last season, are just one game into their domestic campaign — two stoppage-time goals saw them beat Slaven Belupo 2-0 on Sunday. By contrast, Shels have played 26 Premier Division matches this year, but O'Brien played down any suggestion that they would have the edge in terms of match sharpness. 'When you get to a certain level of player, and this is a certain level of team, this is one of those teams where there are obviously professionals. I think people from the outside really make a big thing of that. 'Just from my own experience of playing, when you're playing at a high level, you're a professional 24 hours a day, every day of the year. I think from that point of view, the days are gone where in the off-season, lads used to go out on the batter and put on bleedin' half a stone and then burn it off in pre-season. That's not the case anymore. Especially when you get to this level, these are serious teams and serious players.' O'Brien hopes lessons will have been learned from Shels' Champions League exit at the hands of Qarabag last month. In the first leg, especially, individual errors proved costly, with the Azerbaijan outfit going 3-0 up to effectively end the tie, while the 1-0 away defeat was also far from satisfactory. 'When you have your opportunity on the ball, you've got to keep the football. That was probably one thing last week against Qarabag in the first half, especially, we were guilty of too many easy, cheap turnovers, and we gave away possession. Against this calibre of opposition, you keep on turning over the ball, they're going to just pin you in.' Joey O'Brien has urged his side to "attack" the game. Evan Logan / INPHO Evan Logan / INPHO / INPHO Defeat over two legs would send the reigning Premier Division champions into a Uefa Conference League qualifying play-off. They would face either the Faroese side Vikingur or NIFL Premiership outfit Linfield, whom they have already defeated 2-1 on aggregate in the first round of the Champions League qualifiers. But O'Brien says his squad have given no thought to this potential outcome, with the focus firmly on Rijeka. 'I don't really care what people outside the dressing room think. My focus is on what I can control, and I'd like to think I can have some control over the dressing room. 'I just feel as a player, [you're in trouble if] you start letting yourself think like that and 'maybe this might happen and we get these again'. 'You want to go out and challenge yourself, and you want to attack what's in front of you. I think you're at your best when you don't have that safety net, or you think it's okay to lose, or: 'It's okay if you get beat here, it's not too bad.' That's not how you play football. That's not how I am as a person.'
RTÉ News
3 hours ago
- RTÉ News
'We hate Plan Bs' - Joey O'Brien urges Shelbourne to put best foot forward and play to win
Joey O'Brien has urged his Shelbourne side to put their best foot forward against Rijeka in tomorrow night's Europa League clash, and emphasised that there is no talk of a Plan B in the dressing room. Shelbourne would go into the play-off round of the Europa League – one tie from the league phase – should they beat Rijeka over two legs, however, there is also a viable way into the Conference League equivalent should O'Brien's side get beaten. A re-match with Linfield, a team Shelbourne have already beaten this summer, could be on the cards in such a scenario, however, the manager believes that it would be counterproductive to even assess that situation ahead of a vital game with the Croatian champions. O'Brien was cautiously optimistic about his side's chances of progression against a "really strong" side, while adding that it would be a "monster task" to go through. The Shelbourne manager believes that his side come into the tie as underdogs, however, the intention remains to set up to win the game, taking into account the soaring temperatures and the unknowns when coming up against a new side. "I think they are favourites," said O'Brien, speaking at the pre-match press conference. "It's going to be a really difficult game, but it's a game that we can't wait for. "We have a game-plan to try to set up to win the game, that's the way we always play. That's the aim of the game, every time we go out and play, we look to win. "If you have a game-plan just sitting in trying to survive for 90 minutes, I don't think it works like that." O'Brien sees possession as a key factor in European competition and he believes that his side will show their capabilities if they can keep control of the football for sustained periods of play. However, the manager has urged caution ahead of the game and has told his players that they really need to show total concentration in the early stages to get a real understanding of the opposition and how to implement the aforementioned game-plan. "In European football, you need to get into possession, and I think we showed that against Qarabag in the previous round that when we get on the ball and show quality, we're a good team. That's one of my big messages to our players tomorrow, is to put your best foot forward," said O'Brien. "It's that feeling out of each other," he added. "The lads have seen e n ough video of them now at this stage. Seeing who the individual players are going to come up against and certain patterns they work as a team. "But again, you never really know until you're out on the pitch and you see the movements and you see how quick they are and stuff like that. "So we obviously need to be on guard of that because we've learned before that you cannot give away moments in the start of the game really because otherwise you're going to turn into a long night. "It's about, making sure we're on guard in that first half." And O'Brien believes that his side have being building momentum through a string of good performances in both the league and in European competition, and while he still rues that first leg performance against Qarabag, where they lost 3-0 at Tolka Park, he feels that his team bounced back impressively in the second leg. "I think we've been playing good stuff over the last little while," said O'Brien, when asked about confidence levels within the squad ahead of the game. "In the Qarabag game, it was a really tough opposition, and we're disappointed how we started the game in the first half. We let them settle into it a little bit. But I thought second half we were really good again and had the momentum of the game. "Then over in Qarabag, the lads again done really well, and we were able to make changes, which shows the strength of the squad that we have. We done really well in that game, I felt. The game-plan was decent enough, we had a couple of chances and should have scored, so who knows how that leg could have went?" And as for Plan B, O'Brien was not entertaining talk about what possibilities could come via the Conference League. "I spoke to the lads about it. We hate Plan B's and we're not thinking about Plan B. If you think about Plan B, you take your eye off the ball. "As a player, if you start letting yourself think like that, 'maybe this might happen or we get these again', that's not the way you play football. "You want to go out and challenge yourself and attack what's in front of you and I think you're at your best when you don't have that safety net or you think, it's OK to lose, it's not too bad. "It's going to be a monster game. Irish teams, our record in Europe away from home against stronger teams and stronger countries over the years isn't very good. "So it's going to be a monster task but it's the task that we want and we're going to embrace and we're going to try and put our best foot forward and get a result."
Irish Examiner
3 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
'I hate Plan Bs': O'Brien's eyes fixed firmly on Rijeka
Europa League third round; Rijeka v Shelbourne, Stadion HNK Rijeka - Weds, 7.45pm Irish time. Plan Bs are for strategists that don't include Joey O'Brien. Shelbourne's manager sees Rijeka, instead of potentially Linfield, as the team to beat for the Reds to secure a maiden European league phase participation. The Croatian double-winners his team faces in the coastal city of Rijeka have form in that regard, reaching the Europa group stages four times between 2014 and 2021. Ludogorets tumbled them back into that eyeline with an extra-time 3-1 Champions League victory last week. Defeat came with a deeper cost of losing two influential attackers, Gabriel Rukavina and Toni Fruk, to red cards and suspension for this first leg. They'll still fancy accounting for the Irish visitors over a tie which concludes next Tuesday at Tolka Park. Managed by former Montenegrin international Radomir Đalović and captained by Bosnia Herzegovina goalkeeper Martin Zlomislić, their squad is a cross-section of nationalities spawned from the former Yugoslavia. The cascading nature of the champions path presents Shels with another shot at the Conference League group if their mission fails. It would probably entail a derby match against Linfield, or more succinctly a rematch after the League of Ireland prevailed in the first All-Island clash last month. Former Ireland international O'Brien is aware of the permutations from Monday's draw, without letting the minds of his players wander towards future possibilities. While Shels players have highlighted the kudos and financial rewards from having six extra games in the next phase, their singular focus on getting there is through the Europa. 'I spoke to the players and I said I hate Plan Bs,' he asserted. 'If you think about Plan B, blah, blah, blah, you take your eye off the ball. You play safe and you play as if it's not too big a deal. 'This is it for us. This is the game we want to attack and this is the tie we want to win.' Shels may have Conor Kearns returning in goal. He limped off in the second, away leg against Linfield to be replaced by Lorcan Healy and then new capture Wessel Speel but could be fit to resume. Qarabag, another team with European pedigree, inflicted a 4-0 defeat on Shels in the second round and O'Brien was loath to offer an opinion on how this test compares. 'It's hard to say because, looking at them from the Ludogorets game, they were the better team and should have won that tie. 'We're prepared for a tough game but there's only so much we can talk about the opposition. It's about players knowing that while we'll have to suffer for times without the ball, biting down the gumshield at times to get through them, we've to make the most of our spells in possession. 'We were guilty last week against Qarabag of too many cheap turnovers, especially in the first half. If you keep giving away possession against this calibre of team, they'll pin you in, the momentum is with them for chances and it's a long night.'
