It’s lucky for Ireland that Belgium’s players can’t stand their coach. As Romelu Lukaku slotted home the third goal after Ciaran Clark had made another calamitous mistake in Bordeaux following his own goal against Sweden, it was tempting to wonder what this Belgian side would be like with a manager who gets it right.
Marc Wilmots had gone into this game with his future at stake, but Ireland were undone by a team full of talented individuals who seemed to end the game in harmony with their manager. Belgium looked like a side that could go on and win the tournament, as Martin O’Neil had predicted beforehand.
At the time, that had sounded like a bit of sugar from O’Neill, but Ireland played here in Bordeaux as if they had believed him. They played as if they feared the worst from the moment the game began.
Before the Ireland players went into a huddle at the start of the game, Wes Hoolahan and Shane Long hesitated, with Wes delivering some final words.
Perhaps it was a tactical instruction, but it may simply have been a good luck message as Hoolahan knew what was going to be required of Long all afternoon. He was going to run and run. And run. He would, as John Aldridge had to do under Jack Charlton, run his legs into stumps.
It was less effective than it had been in Charlton’s day.
For 45 minutes, Ireland did little but give the ball away. Belgium’s goals came in the second half when Ireland were trying to play a bit more, but made other mistakes instead. There are those like Jose Mourinho who might see an important lesson in that, but others will wonder what would have happened if Ireland had been braver earlier in the afternoon.
Some will point to the strange decisions of referee Cuneyt Cakir, particularly his failure to award Ireland a penalty when Shane Long was kicked in the head at the start of the second half.
Crazy decision https://t.co/RWi5gpn5nb
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) June 18, 2016
Belgium broke on the counter-attack while Long was on the ground and Lukaku finished beautifully. It provided Ireland with a sense of injustice, but the result was not caused by that one poor decision. Ireland encountered a better team with better players and they did little to close the gulf in class. Long had also got away with a heavy tackle on Yannick Carrasco at the end of the first half, so the referee was bewildering both sides.
Now O’Neill’s side will need to beat Italy in Lille on Wednesday if they are to make it into the next round. Those who had imagined an Ireland victory in Bordeaux were imagining Ireland essentially qualifying with a game to spare. That wouldn’t really be Ireland’s way.
It never looked like happening. The game was scoreless at half-time, but Ireland had allowed Belgium’s gifted players to play their way into the game.
The side Wilmots sent out was terrifying on paper. And, it turned out, on the pitch as well. After the Italy defeat, Carrasco responded to a fan who had criticised the selection and provided an alternative with Carrasco in the side. “I agree,” he said in a post he quickly deleted, but it added to the swirl around the Belgian side. But the narrative would be shaped by the result.
That wouldn’t necessarily be much good to Ireland. Belgium started brilliantly, helped by an Ireland approach where surrendering the ball seemed to be a tactic, no matter how quickly it came back at them.
Ireland’s approach seemed to undermine Ireland in subtle ways. They had so little of the ball that when they did have it, they were determined to make the right decision and took to long that it became the wrong decision.
Hoolahan hesitated on the edge of the box, caught between passing to Hendrick and shooting himself. Later Hendrick – who at least grew into the game – could have been quicker getting the ball to Long and this told of an Ireland side unsure of themselves.
If they were uncertain, Belgium put all their problems to one side. Kevin De Bruyne and Mousa Dembele dominated. Clark had tried an early hefty challenge on De Bruyne, but it didn’t affect his play. Clark would try and go in harder later with calamitous consequences.
By then it seemed like a familiar story. Not one of those fantastic tales from Ireland’s glorious past, but a more depressing tape that has been played on loop. The one where Ireland’s players are technically inferior to their opponents and end the day slumped in bewilderment at the outcome.
We have seen that film before, most notably in Poland four years ago. Now Martin O’Neill must find a way of shaping a different ending when Ireland play Italy again on Wednesday night.
