1.) 16 Feb 2019
16 Feb 2019 18:35:36
Thanks Tris. Given that we have been established in the top flight for 50 years or so and not yoyoing up and down, I’m so glad that O’Neil didn’t join us. I think he was being touted around the end of the Houllier era, wasn’t he? A lot of clamour from our fans at the time IIRC?

{Ed001's Note - yes mate, no idea why though.}


2.) 16 Feb 2019
16 Feb 2019 19:45:01
So was Alan Curbishley.

O'Neill spectacularly went to pieces in his last two years as Ireland manager. It wasn't just long ball or direct football, it ended up as "absolutely no football whatsoever". I don't expect an Ireland manager to try and have the Boys in Green try and pass their way around Germany or France, or even teams like Denmark who aren't exactly world class, but have a little extra that we don't.

But halfway through the 2018 World Cup campaign (at one point, Ireland led the group with a respectable away draw to Serbia and a win against Austria), we went away to Georgia, we scored early and then sat back and invited them onto us. It was Georgia. Not Brazil. We should've been able to play some bit of football against them, but once we were a goal up we didn't even try. Sure enough they equalised we drew the match and things kinda nosedived from there. I suspect Roy Keane's 'impact' on the squad was taking away from the only good thing O'Neill could do: motivate the players.

And then there was his fascination with changing the formation every other match, and putting Cyrus Christie and James McClean in every position but their best ones (admittedly in which they weren't brilliant in anyway) .


3.) 16 Feb 2019
16 Feb 2019 19:48:07
Actually now that I think of it, didn't O'Neill's Celtic side dump us out of the UEFA Cup in 2003 (the only thing memorable about that for us was the discovery of the rare Senagalese Spitting Cobra) and then went on to the final that year?

Could've been why some people were going for O'Neill.


4.) 17 Feb 2019
16 Feb 2019 21:23:21
As an Irishmen its hard to know what to think of O'Neil especially with how the last 2 or so years have played out. Its left a lot of fans including myself, bitter to say the least. But I think this profile pretty much sums him up, a great motivator who isn't the best coach of tactician. I feel like the games past him by now and I don't think he has what it takes to adapt.

The juxtaposition between him and Keane sounds like a fun idea on paper, but Keane is incredibly toxic and he needs to disassociate himself to have a fighting chance. Regardless the Euro's were fun ride and I wish him the best at Forrest. Cheers for the profile Ed001.

{Ed001's Note - welcome mate.}


5.) 17 Feb 2019
17 Feb 2019 12:55:50
What really got me about Keane in the Ireland job was the hypocrisy. I knew the man was an idiot and a bully, but I thought he at least had some degree of principle about how football should be played.

He was a poor enough manager in his own right, but he at least tried to have his teams play football. His big downfall seemed to be his inability to understand why Championship players couldn't play like him and Paul Scholes at their peaks if he shouted at them enough.

But with O'Neill, he sat there acting as the attack dog for a manager serving up the most negative, turgid, mis-shapen, disorganised crap I've ever seen from a football team anywhere (I really cannot put into to words how bad a game of football the 0-0 away draw with Denmark was, for example. Two pub teams playing on a bog the day after a triple 21st birthday celebration would've been ashamed of it) . Had he been in the dressing room as a player he'd have probably walked out on the squad in a huff. But he was happy to get a fat paycheck from the FAI to enable it as Assistant Manager.

And then to boot, after he's sacked, he comes back as a pundit spitting poison at teams who are 10 times better than anything Ireland served up while he was there.

Just a very poor quality bloke all round really.


6.) 18 Feb 2019
18 Feb 2019 00:14:27
Please -Something Red- never speak of the 0-0 away draw with Denmark. Potentially the worst game of 'football' I'm had the displeasure of watching in its entirety.

Keane was an incredible player, but like so many incredible players his ability as a manager, coach and even pundit is questionable to say the least.