Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
Sport
Paul O'Hehir

Stephen Kenny livid after sloppy defending leads to another loss

Stephen Kenny was livid after seeing Ireland sink to a late defeat against Norway.

And the Ireland boss knows his team cannot afford to be so sloppy when they host France in the opening Euro qualifier next March.

Alan Browne cancelled out Leo Ostigard first-half opener but Ohi Omoijuanfo pounced on a Nathan Collins error five minutes before time.

Both of Norway’s goals came from set-pieces, which a deflated Kenny accepted full responsibility for afterwards.

The Ireland boss said: “To concede a goal like that, it undid all the good work. It was a terrible goal for us to concede and we're not happy with it.

“But I don’t think we deserved to lose. It was a very even match overall. But I’m disappointed that we didn’t create chances in the first half.

“Norway play a very compact out-of-possession system but the space is on the outside and we couldn’t penetrate enough in the first half.

“But Matt Doherty and Callum O’Dowda had a lot of joy in the second half and we created good chances before we scored.

“We didn’t let those missed chances erode our spirit. We had to work so hard for the lead so it was really disappointing to concede like that.”

Kenny spoke in the build up of wanting to use the Norway and Malta friendlies to fine tune so Ireland could hit the ground running in the Euro qualifiers.

Yet they were gripped by familiar failings here and Ireland’s inability to string a consistent run of results together remains a concern going into the New Year.

But Kenny said: “It’s a completely different game tactically in March. We did a lot of things well tonight but our defending for both set pieces was poor.

“We knew Ostigard was really good in the air because we’ve seen him do that for Napoli. We know what he does and it wasn’t good enough from us.

“And the second goal, we have six against three and Nathan Collins has headed it against the player and he scored. It’s a bad goal that we conceded.”

Kenny continued: “Norway are a good team. We had a lot of possession but we couldn’t penetrate them. We needed our front two to stretch their back four more than they did.

“It’s the first time Michael Obafemi and Callum Robinson have played together to be fair. Second-half, the movement was a lot better and Callum caused a lot of problems.

“We were much better in the second-half. We switched the play quicker and overloaded in wide areas with Matt Doherty and Calum O’Dowda.”

Norway boss Stale Solbakken said “not to bet the house” on Manchester City ace Erling Haaland featuring in Sunday’s clash with Finland having sat this one out.

And on his side’s win, Solbakken said: “Overall we had a few more chances for them and probably deserved to win.

“It was huge for us to get the win. I saw the statistics before the game and I think Ireland only had one loss here in nine or something.

“We’ve great respect for the Ireland team, they had their moments in the game but we managed to control them and it was important to get the win. “

READ NEXT:

Get the latest sports headlines straight to your inbox by signing up for free email alerts

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.