Frustrated Ireland fall to France at EuroHockey Championships

Irish Times

3 days ago

EuroHockey Championship: Ireland 0 France 1
Ireland endured an exasperating 60 minutes at the EuroHockey Championships in Mönchengladbach on Monday afternoon when they missed a host of chances on their way to their first ever competitive defeat to France.
The result means that while they still have a mathematical chance of reaching the semi-finals, with Germany as their final pool opponents on Wednesday, it's highly improbable.
Monday's game was decided by Mathilde Duffrène in the 49th minute when she fired home from a needlessly conceded penalty corner that was upgraded from a free after Ireland failed to retreat in time when France attempted to take it quickly.
Ireland amassed 13 penalty corners, but while they tested French goalkeeper Lucie Ehrmann on a number of occasions, they failed to convert. Most frustrating was their lack of variation and the puzzling failure to make more use of Róisín Upton's drag flick skills.
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There were plenty of missed opportunities from open play too, Katie Mullan guilty of wasting the best of them in the first quarter when, after hitting the post, she sent the rebound high over the bar from close range.
Ireland dominated the opening quarter, winning seven corners in all – Hannah McLoughlin, Sarah Torrans and Niamh Carey seeing their efforts either saved by Ehrmann, or going agonisingly wide. But the longer they failed to turn their superiority into goals, the more confident France became, Lizzy Murphy twice called in to action early in the second quarter when Emma van der Zanden broke through.
Caoimhe Perdue in action for Ireland. Photograph: Frank Uijlenbroek/Inpho
Soon after, an increasingly ambitious France – ranked eight places below Ireland – looked to have taken the lead when Paola Le Nindre picked out Catherine Clot at the left post from a penalty corner, but Clot's sweep past Murphy rose above the backboard so the effort was disallowed.
Ireland continued to create chances, Mullan failing to get a touch on Carey's bullet of a ball across the face of goal, but their general play was poor and hurried, with strings of misplaced passes and an over-reliance on trying to thread balls through the centre of a packed French defence. They had more joy when they went wide, but didn't do it often enough.
They had their fair share of misfortune too, McLoughlin's crisp strike from a penalty corner deflecting off the stick of a defender on to Ehrmann's pads and going wide, while Torrans had a beaut of a reverse strike ruled out after the ball brushed her foot. Caoimhe Perdue was also left cursing Ehrmann's excellent day at the office when she saved her goal-bound effort.
In a desperate attempt to find an equaliser, Ireland took Murphy off with five minutes to go, but they were down to 10 outfield players again when Mullan was yellow-carded soon after for barging in to the back of a French player.
Ireland have had their fair share of frustrating tournament days down the years, but this one will probably go to the top of the list.
'We're gutted,' said Mullan after. 'We had a lot of opportunities out there but we couldn't find the back of the net. The French goalkeeper was phenomenal, but our attack has to take a hard look at itself because we expect more. We had the chances but we didn't take them.'
Ireland face Germany in their last pool game on Wednesday, 7pm Irish time.
IRELAND
: E Murphy; E Curran, H McLoughlin, R Upton, S McAuley; K McKee, S Hawkshaw (capt), C Hamill; N Carey, K Mullan, M Carey.
Rolling subs
: C Perdue, C Beggs, M Power, E Kealy, K Larmour, S Torrans.