Upbeat Irish to build on Spanish win

An outstanding victory over European Youth Championship title favourites Spain safely in the bag, the Irish management team turned their attention to group outsiders Georgia at yesterday morning's lighter than usual training session where, for the 11 who started on Monday night, the schedule consisted of little more than a relaxed knockabout.

Last night the squad, who had spent considerable time studying a video of the Spaniards in action before taking them on, sat down with their own technical staff who had watched Italy beat Georgia on Monday as well as a group of Danish coaches to formulate their gameplan. A slightly confused picture emerged with some feeling that the Georgians were hard done by in the 2-0 defeat but the UEFA account of the game, in which the Italians also hit the woodwork twice, gave the winners the verdict by a very comfortable margin while the Italian coach angrily denounced his players for their many squandered opportunities.

Irish manager Brian Kerr said that he expects changes to be made by the Georgians, whose commitment to their youth development programme is made clear by the fact that their team here this week spent two weeks preparing in Germany before arriving in Linkoping a week ahead of their opening game.

Against Italy they played 4-5-1 "and the lad up front never stopped working, chasing after everyone of the Italians and by all accounts causing them one or two problems. But the fact is that they need this match and so I'd reckon they'll go with a second man up there."

Though he will take on board the approach of his opposition, he is likely to be far less concerned with their style this time than he was against the Spaniards. "I don't think anyone really expected us to win that match. Certainly not Spain because they've been winning more or less everything recently and when that sort of thing happens you get great confidence in the camp.

"I thought that they lost it a bit after we scored, though, and maybe you could put that down to the fact that they knew that when we've played them in recent years and managed to take the lead that we've generally gone on to win the game."

Having watched the game on television again later on Monday night, Kerr again paid tribute to his back four of Greg O'Halloran, Jason Gavin, Clive Clarke and John Frost, all of whom, he said "have plenty of experience at club level but were being asked to do something new in this game" as well as to Peter Murphy of Blackburn Rovers who came on for Frost at half-time.

Though Frost's game is well suited to the role of a wing back Murphy did particularly well when he came on, and given that the team performed better as a whole during the second period he seems likely to get the nod ahead of the Waterford United player this afternoon. Elsewhere there may be one or two changes with Graham Barrett and Trevor Fitzpatrick both in with a chance if Kerr opts to switch to a 4-4-2 formation.

"Previous experience of these tournaments would certainly have taught us that generally the best thing to do is to change it about a bit and bring in some fresh legs," remarked Kerr as his players wrapped up training early in order to take in a spell at a local swimming pool.

"The important thing, though, is that we build on what was a very good win. In Scotland last year we started with a 2-1 defeat by the French when we were fairly well outplayed and that makes things fairly tough. This time we have the opportunity to go into the last game in a fairly strong position."

If the Irish do beat the Georgians in the little town of Finspang then just how strong their position in the final game will depend on tonight's other result.

A win for the Italians would make for an enthralling showdown between the two group leaders on Friday evening. If the Spaniards draw or win this evening then Ireland would need just a point in their last outing in order to make the final.