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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
Sport
Michael Scully

Nathan Collins 'heartbroken' as he details 'frustrated' Ireland dressing room after defeat to France

Repeat viewing of how he was denied a priceless equaliser against France only made things worse for Nathan Collins after Ireland's opening Euro 2024 qualifier.

Having had time to digest Mike Maignan's 90th minute wonder save from his header, Collins was still distraught as he left the Aviva Stadium after the 1-0 defeat to one of the world's top sides.

"I’ve seen it back and it’s even worse than I thought," admitted the big defender of the save that his colleague Jayson Molumby later described as a "worldie".

READ MORE: Ireland v France match report

Collins despaired: “I thought I’d done everything. I got as high as I could, I got power behind it, but it’s an unbelievable save.

"We know set-pieces are a big threat and we all go our different ways and we caused problems. I got a header on it but it was a fantastic save.

"That’s the difference at the top level, it’s so frustrating. Heartbroken for the lads as well.

"There's a lot of frustration (in the dressing-room). Lads are down, down and hurt. We put so much into that.

"The coaches are hurting, tactically think we got it spot on, it was so frustrating. But dust ourselves down and go again in three months' time.

“They’re so good, they’re going to get a chance and they took it. We did so well to stay in the game and throw the kitchen sink in the 10ten minutes. But I’m proud of the lads performance, there is so much to build on.

"The crowd were unbelievable, it was one of the best, most passionate things I’ve ever seen in my life. It drove me so much forward.

"I thought we did deserve it, we caused them so many problems, I thought they were struggling to deal with at times but that’s the quality of them, they kept a clean sheet and we didn’t."

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