Ireland didn't play attractive football when they had the players to - so why try it now?

Ireland
(Image credit: PA Images)

Shane Duffy won the Republic of Ireland’s goal-of-the-year award for 2020. He was the runaway winner, with the sort of share of the vote a dictator who rigs elections could only envy: 100 percent. It is because Shane Duffy scored Ireland’s only goal of 2020. 

That is facetious: actually, the FAI’s official website shows no goal of the year for 2020, while even the 2019 prize went for an Under-21 strike, by Troy Parrott. There should at least be more competition for the 2021 award. Alan Browne’s header against Serbia on Wednesday was a belated first goal in open play under Stephen Kenny, 768 minutes into his reign. James Collins’ late consolation was the first by anyone remotely resembling a forward.

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Richard Jolly

Richard Jolly also writes for the National, the Guardian, the Observer, the Straits Times, the Independent, Sporting Life, Football 365 and the Blizzard. He has written for the FourFourTwo website since 2018 and for the magazine in the 1990s and the 2020s, but not in between. He has covered 1500+ games and remembers a disturbing number of the 0-0 draws.