Åge Hareide took a bit of a beating from the Danish public after the draw in Copenhagen and he reacted aggressively.
He talked about Denmark’s superior footballing ability, Ireland’s desire to not play football, and his confidence that his team would get the job done. Granted, in hindsight, his thoughts were well-placed but they were also brash and, in the context of Ireland’s campaign in general and outside of that freak deviant on Tuesday night, they were a little disrespectful.
It’s understandable though that he must’ve felt tremendous fulfillment after that thrashing in Dublin when his team was being criticised and questions were circling of whether or not they were really up for it enough. He too responded to his own critics with a ruthless drubbing that allowed a Norwegian manager to take Denmark to the World Cup.
It’s more understandable that he’d want to take credit for the masterclass, particularly that of Christian Eriksen who was largely quiet in the first leg but turned around with a special hat-trick in the second. Hareide believes they had trained (on Sunday and Monday, of course – after the flight) to free up Eriksen more and the way they would do that is with Ireland playing in a diamond formation – which, obviously, he anticipated even though they haven’t played it in a big game in a long time.
“It seems like when they played with two forwards in a diamond, we got a lot of space, centrally,” Hareide told RTÉ after the game.
“That’s the danger of a diamond.
“We trained on that and we hoped they would come in with a diamond so we kept more space for Christian… and they did.”
But they didn’t.
Ireland’s diamond formation was working brilliantly and it was not freeing up Christian Eriksen at all. The central channel, if anything, was more compact because that’s what happens when you don’t play wide players and play everyone else… centrally.
Ireland started with McClean and Murphy up top and that worked too. The backline were being pressed high and early which meant they were deeper than they were when they were at home and the four midfielders were not only dominating the physical exchanges in the middle but, for large spells, they were playing good football.
Two more decent chances presented themselves when Ireland were already a goal ahead and Eriksen was not running riot with all this space he was supposed to have, space that the manager had apparently anticipated.
What actually happened was that, from a corner, Harry Arter got nutmegged and Cyrus Christie scored an own goal. It had nothing to do with the diamond.
What actually happened was that Ward gave the ball away on the half way line (after Arter passed way back to him for no reason when Ireland had committed to attack with men in the box) and Denmark ran through three on two. It had nothing to do with the diamond.
What actually happened was that O’Neill abandoned the diamond and ripped out the midfield at half time and that gave Eriksen the space.
McGeady’s introduction was unforgivable anyway because everyone else knew what he’d offer for those 45 minutes but to do it at the expense of a second central midfielder was crazy.
Liam Brady produced his best moment in years on RTÉ’s post-match analysis when Darragh Maloney put it to him during the debate, ‘who should McGeady have come on for then if not Meyler or Arter?’
Brady paused, he looked a little baffled, then he looked a little annoyed that he was even made to go thinking about that answer.
“No-one,” he replied.
Hoolahan was needed. McGeady wasn’t. As a separate issue though, central midfielders were needed. Anchors were needed. And Hoolahan should’ve had that behind him.
For Eriksen’s second goal, Hendrick was left one-on-two in front of the backline and it was just a simple roll to the best player on the pitch who was free 20 yards out.
That was the danger of how O’Neill sent the team out in the second period without players to play in that role. They weren’t even in a diamond, it was two attack-minded ball-players in front of the defence chasing a deficit and that’s when Eriksen got that space.
His hat-trick was teed up by Ward. It was nothing to do with a diamond.
Åge Hareide deserves credit for making the World Cup with Denmark especially off the back of a disastrous start to the campaign. He doesn’t deserve credit for exploiting Ireland’s diamond though because Ireland’s diamond wasn’t exploited.
Age Hareide said he was hoping Ireland would play a diamond formation so Christian Eriksen would get more space. #rtesoccer #irldan pic.twitter.com/94V2cFwLTr
— RTÉ Soccer (@RTEsoccer) November 14, 2017
