France Vs Ireland Oct 9th

im going to the france ireland match in paris october 9th. over 25000 irish applied to the footballl association of ireland for tickets. my friend was randomly selected by computer and got two tickets. he had like probably a 1 in a 200 chance of getting tickets. he gave the other one to me as you have probably guessed. the tickets havent actuallly arrived yet though think they are been posted next week. we are shocked we got tickets but we are delighted its going to be a great weekend. over 20000 irish are expected to travel to paris many without tickets. the match on a saturday we are flying in friday night and going home monday evening (all the flights back on sunday were booked out) the only bad thing is ill be broke after weekend and am going to have to stay in the next few sat nights trying to spare money. i hope the paris nightlife will make up for it.

as it stands ireland and france both have 4 points.
matchday 1
Ireland beat cyrus 3-0 at home
France drew 0-0 wit irasel at home
matchday2
Ireland drew 1-1 away with switzerland
france beat the faroe islands 2-0 away

Zidane,Thuram, Lizaruaru,Desailly all retired international duty after euro 2004
Claude Makele retired 2 wks ago after not been picked for game against faroe islands
Vieria is suspended for ireland game

with all the above missing and frances less than immpressive current form plus irelands habit of rising to the occassion against big teams i think we will get a result either a draw or win.

For those of ye who are not familar with the irish team here is how i would expect us to line up taking into account injuries and form

Given(Newcastle)

Finnan(Liverpool) O'Brien(Newcastle) Cunnigham(Birimigham) O'Shea(Man Utd)

Reid(Notts Forest) Keane(Man Utd) Kilbane(Everton) Duff(Chelsea)

Robbie Keane(Spurs) Morrrison(Birimigham)


France on the hand will have Henry and Trezeguet(who seems to be back in form unfortunately 3 goals in games in serie a for juve)

i may be too optimistic here but im predicting 1-0 to ireland with Roy Keane scoring.(but it doesnt really matter who scores)
What way does everyone else see the match going? as we all support milan we are all knowledge football fans so the poll should be accurate if everyone who is familar with the teams votes.

Go ON Ireland!
You have a very good team, possibly one of the best in the last years (actually my knowledge is not that accurate).

I will be your supporter in these qualifyes

Originally Posted by Giovanni

Go ON Ireland!
You have a very good team, possibly one of the best in the last years (actually my knowledge is not that accurate).

I will be your supporter in these qualifyes

thanks yeah it probably is our best team since Italia '90 well in my opionon anyway though im not sure all the irish newspapers would agree with me.
im really looking forward to it. it will be my first time at an Ireland away match, ive been at a few home games but not many very hard to get tickets cost landsdown road our stadium can only hold round 40000. in fact i have been at more milan games 4 than irish games 3. the last irish game i was at was a qualifer for euro 2004 when we beat kalazde's georiga 2-0 was not long after we had won the champions league. he played good. i was wearing a white milan jersey but with an irish flag wrapped around me behind one of the goals

I think France will win, because they play at home and have more good players than Ireland. I will support Ireland, because I like some of their players: S.Carr, S.Given.

i think that Kilbane should be replaced with Kavanagh, No disrespect to Kilbane he always gives his best but it might be better to have Kavanagh in as he is a better central midfielder.
As for Reid he better go quick and apologise to Kinnear and get some first team football under him.

if ireland play like we did against holland a few months back we can win

did anyone go to the ireland-brazil match? dida was super!!! i guess tickets were hard to find

I reckon Ireland could sneak a draw maybe 1 - 1

If Keane plays like he did today they will be near unbeatable because he was absolutely brilliant

Doesnt Carr get in the side anymore? He has started well in his Toon career. Maybe Finnan could play instead of Kilbane in midfield and then Carr at RB?

I definately think Ireland could nick a point over there, possibly more, certainly if the French perform as they have been. I think it all depends how France play on the day. I still reckon that even without Zidane, Thuram, Lizarazu and Makelele they should have enough quality to beat most sides if they perform. Vieira missing is a blow for them though no doubt. It could be in midfield where the Irish could make it difficult for them, keeping the game tight and stopping them playing. For me the French sides of the last few years, at their best always looked so balanced in Midfield. For me, There is no-one around who can do the things Zidane can do and he gave France an authority and a creative strength that they will obviously miss very very badly. Pedretti looks to me as if he could be a good long term replacement but he is not Zidane and is inexperienced. Vieira and Makelele always looked good together and were a fantastic base for the likes of Zidane and Pires to play. Whether France can find this blend again in the short term remains to be seen and they certainly look a bit, well, empty in there now.

Actually Keano did look good tonight. I thought that games were starting to pass him by but he looked sharp again and was pretty dominant. I'll be interested to see how he performs against the French. I was impressed by Damian Duff yesterday against Spurs though, I thought he really livened up what was otherwise a pretty boring game. I've never been his biggest fan really but he caused Tottenham all sorts of problems, although he was only on for a short while.

Allez Les Verts!!!!

3 votes for ireland
2 for france
1 for draw
so far its pretty close my views on some of the comments so far:
1) yes keane was very good last night completely dominated midfield, it was like the roy keane of old, good to see unfortunately however he is after been charged by the police for assualt though today, but he is not the type to let that affect his performance.

2) stephen carr vs steven finnan: i think finnan will get the nod but it will be a close call, both played the last game against the swiss but o' shea was injured for that and i expect him to resume at left back where finnan played. however finnan played much better than carr in the last game so i think he will be moved to right back. carr had good game for newcastle at weekend though.
3) kilbane vs kavannagh is a tough call, i think kilbane offers more going forward though. he also has more international experience. Matt Holland captain of charlton Athlethic is injured and is not expected to be fit in time. he would have been the ideal partner for keane in midfield. kilbane and kavannagh could both play if reid is dropped as kilbane could play on the left with duff going over to the right.

any french members here? your views plus the expected team would make this thread more interesting.

the only french i remember is David Gallo who has clearly italian origins and i doubt he supports the Bleus instead of Italian team, as i can remember

Hope Pires will be among the start line-up this time.

what about young Elliot at sunderland??? he is doing well lately

Originally Posted by paolobalde

what about young Elliot at sunderland??? he is doing well lately

its too big a game to risk the likes of him, would not mind seeing McGeady of celtic in the squad though but not in the starting 11.
france are now ahead in the poll, we need more voters!

i know it is a big game but morrison or keane are not performing and what is better?? Two strikers that have the experience but are not scoring OR a striker that has a lot of u-21 experience and is free scoring at the moment.

Remember back in brussels. McCarthy brought Connolly, Quinn and Cascarino who were going through a bad spell. He went for the tried and trusted. Ireland lost that night two-one.

That same night a 17 yr old by the name of Robbie keane was scoring yet another goal for Wolves!!!!!