All Whites v Ireland | Wednesday 22nd November | 8.45am NZT | Aviva Stadium, Dublin

Imposing looking Irish squad, but get the feeling they will offer the best chance of a result over the 2 games.

Will be all about McClean's retirement for them, and maybe a relaxed party type build up after a disappointing Euros campaign. While the Greeks will be all business preparation leading into a big Euros qualifier for them against France.

https://www.irishpost.com/sport/kenny-names-24-man-squad-for-november-games-263331

James McClean set to link up with the squad for the New Zealand fixture at the @AVIVAStadium for his final Ireland appearance 💚 pic.twitter.com/3RLJwyNQ24 — Ireland Football ⚽️🇮🇪 (@IrelandFootball) November 9, 2023

James McClean will return to the Ireland squad for the New Zealand friendly with the match set to be his 103rd and final cap for the Republic of Ireland with the player set to retire at the end of the 2023 campaign.

Republic of Ireland Squad - Netherlands & New Zealand

Goalkeepers: Gavin Bazunu (Southampton), Caoimhin Kelleher (Liverpool), Mark Travers (AFC Bournemouth).

Defenders: Matt Doherty (Wolverhampton Wanderers), Festy Ebosele (Udinese), Ryan Manning (Southampton), Liam Scales (Celtic), Shane Duffy (Norwich City), Nathan Collins (Brentford), Dara O’Shea (Burnley), Andrew Omobamidele (Nottingham Forest).

Midfielders: Josh Cullen (Burnley), Jayson Molumby (West Bromwich Albion), Alan Browne (Preston North End), Will Smallbone (Southampton), Jason Knight (Bristol City), Jamie McGrath (Aberdeen), Mark Sykes (Bristol City).

Forwards: Evan Ferguson (Brighton and Hove Albion), Adam Idah (Norwich City), Callum Robinson (Cardiff City), Chiedozie Ogbene (Luton Town), Mikey Johnston (Celtic), Troy Parrott (Excelsior, on loan from Tottenham Hotspur).

Fixtures - November
18/11 - Netherlands v Republic of Ireland, Amsterdam Arena, 7.45pm (8.45pm local time)
21/11 - Republic of Ireland v New Zealand, Aviva Stadium, 7.45pm

Oh and the lineups when we met the Irish 4 years ago, 16th Nov 2019.

Feels like the AWs haven't changed that much since then. The last time Thomas played for the national team!

Ireland a very different squad. I guess when you have much greater depth, you make more changes based on form etc over time.

Republic of Ireland: Kieran O’Hara (Mark Travers, 65′); Lee O’Connor, Cairan Clark, Kevin Long, Derrick Williams (Callum O’Dowda, 55′); Josh Cullen, Jack Byrne (Alan Judge 65′), Alan Browne (Conor Hourihane, 65′); Robbie Brady (captain), Troy Parrott (Callum Robinson, 60′), Seani Maguire (James Collins, 73′)

New Zealand: Stefan Marinovic; Storm Roux (Tim Payne, 90′), Winston Reid (captain) (Bill Tuiloma, HT), Michael Boxall (Tommy Smith, 75′), Liberto Cacace; Sarpeet Singh, Joe Bell, Ryan Thomas (Michael McGlinchey 75′); Callum McCowatt (Elliot Collier, 85′), Chris Wood (Andre de Jong, 75′), Elijah Just 

 
Unused subs - Rojas, McGarry, Mata, Rufer, Ridenton & Woud.

Note that there are now many viewing options for this match and the other AW's friendly.
NZ Football have arranged for these games to be live on the Duke channel on Freeview and TVNZ+ as well as FIFA+:
https://www.nzfootball.co.nz/newsarticle/133928?newsfeedId=1275622
"International football is coming to TVNZ with four All Whites fixtures and two potential Ford Football Ferns games set to be broadcast free to air. 

Following the success of the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which saw more Kiwis watch the game than ever before, the partnership between New Zealand Football and TVNZ will make it easier than ever to follow our national sides in their remaining games of 2023. 

Games will be shown on TVNZ DUKE and TVNZ+"

coochiee

Oh and the lineups when we met the Irish 4 years ago, 16th Nov 2019.

Feels like the AWs haven't changed that much since then. The last time Thomas played for the national team!

Ireland a very different squad. I guess when you have much greater depth, you make more changes based on form etc over time.

Republic of Ireland: Kieran O’Hara (Mark Travers, 65′); Lee O’Connor, Cairan Clark, Kevin Long, Derrick Williams (Callum O’Dowda, 55′); Josh Cullen, Jack Byrne (Alan Judge 65′), Alan Browne (Conor Hourihane, 65′); Robbie Brady (captain), Troy Parrott (Callum Robinson, 60′), Seani Maguire (James Collins, 73′)

New Zealand: Stefan Marinovic; Storm Roux (Tim Payne, 90′), Winston Reid (captain) (Bill Tuiloma, HT), Michael Boxall (Tommy Smith, 75′), Liberto Cacace; Sarpeet Singh, Joe Bell, Ryan Thomas (Michael McGlinchey 75′); Callum McCowatt (Elliot Collier, 85′), Chris Wood (Andre de Jong, 75′), Elijah Just 

 
Unused subs - Rojas, McGarry, Mata, Rufer, Ridenton & Woud.

Except iirc everyone was a bit younger and played quite well? At least better than we’ve been the last few games. Maybe Bell back will help. Singh’s in the squad still? Anything to get away from his club I guess…

There was a pretty scathing assessment of Hay by many on here after that game (his first as AWs coach), and probably being in charge for 3-4 training sessions. Of course there still a fair amount of anger towards him & NZF, after the way Buckingham was treated.

coochiee

There was a pretty scathing assessment of Hay by many on here after that game (his first as AWs coach), and probably being in charge for 3-4 training sessions. Of course there still a fair amount of anger towards him & NZF, after the way Buckingham was treated.

yeah was not a great game from us, next game was worse though. 

Just hope the game isn't so cold this time!

Onto the next one. I want to write that Greece game off as just a bad day at the office for the boys. 

Hoping to see Lewis, Boxall and Crocombe come into the starting lineup. 

Singh was poor today but he looked very good against Doctor Congo so I'd stick with Singh & McCowatt in behind Wood and hope it works out better this time. 

Still holding onto the smallest amount of hope that Bazeley can do a decent job. We looked good in that one half against Qatar, maybe we just need Rojas back. 

Unfortunately Rojas doesn't seem too keen to be playing football. 
Yes I'm happy to give Singh another shot at creating. The rest of the midfield need to step up too.

How Ireland lined up in Amsterdam. I expect they will make wholesale changes for the AWs match in Dublin. Small bonus, they have one day less to prepare than us.

Sounds like its all about a James McClean retirement party for them. Hopefully that means they ain't taking the AWs seriously. Closing down the Woodsman (who played with alot of ex Irish players at Burnley) maybe the sum total of their analysis.

GK Bazunu was Irish player of the day against Holland, so they must have been under the cosh.

https://us.soccerway.com/matches/2023/11/18/europe/european-championship-qualification/netherlands/ireland-republic/3972639/

STARTING XI | Netherlands v Ireland

Evan Ferguson starts in Amsterdam alongside Callum Robinson as Dara O'Shea returns to the starting XI 💚

7.45pm KO (8.45pm local time) with a huge travelling support here in Amsterdam 🇮🇪 pic.twitter.com/Ot68W4Z3qY

— Ireland Football ⚽️🇮🇪 (@IrelandFootball) November 18, 2023

Dutch (2nd, 15 pts) won 1-0, and are now through as the 2nd qualifier from the group. Play minnows Gibraltar on the rock, in their last game. Gibraltar lost 14-0 in Paris!

Greece (3rd, 12 pts) advance to qualifying play-offs via Nations League. They have the French in Athens as their last group game.

Hadn't really noticed how poor their qualification campaign had been until I watched the qualifying highlights show, and the Irish finished on six points from eight games. They lost all the fixtures except home/away against Gibraltar. 

Even further back, they've played forty times since the last time we played them (we've played twenty-one and half) and just won eleven on them. Andorra (1-4), Azerbaijan (0-3), Qatar (4-0), Luxembourg (0-3), Lithuania (1-0), Scotland (3-0), Armenia (3-2), Malta (0-1), Latvia (3-2), Gibraltar (3-0, 0-4). Scotland, Luxembourg - and maybe Armenia/Azerbaijan given they beat Sweden 3-0 - are the only ones I would think would/should be favourites against us. They do actually have a positive goal difference despite winning just 27.5% of those matches (47 for and 41 against).

If you go by UEFA Nations' League ranking, then they have one win against the sixteen League A sides, none against the sixteen in League B, three from the next sixteen in League C and five from League D. Qatar obviously excluded from that, but we've seen from the World Cup, our half against them and the Gold Cup how good they are.

Stephen Kenny not exactly popular as head coach, maybe he can chat to Bazeley about how that feels.

If, as suggested in jest, their prep consists of chatting about Woodsy, we could throw a curve ball and start one of the other three strikers. Chris Wood's last non-penalty goal was the one he scored against the Solomon Islands, nine appearances and 536 minutes ago. Hard to argue he's performing to the level of a Premier League striker if he only scores penalties or against the OFC lads. Even crazier - nobody has scored an open play goal in the last 506 minutes he's played. Compared to four open play goals in the three-and-a-half games without him this year. If NAC Breda are better with Garbett than without, we are better without Wood than with.

Could all be coincidental, but he's definitely waning from his peak Hudson-days and seemingly ever more injured, so why not? He's not fully fit anyway, and the Smith-Bindon-Woud back shows that we aren't fixated on a best XI (and fair enough, nothing real riding on it) given none of them make it. Perhaps deviating from a Wood-based gameplan will benefit the other forward players.  

The flaw in that argument is our backup is not very flash either. 

Waine has the one goal in the Championship, but is 3rd or 4th choice there. Mata hasn’t scored this season. McCowatt isn’t a 9. Perhaps a false 9? And we don’t have any other strikers. Supyk is very young and hasn’t had a run out at the Nix. 

Big call benching the Woodsman. He so nearly had the only goal that's really mattered the last 5 odd years for the AWs, against Costa Rica.

If Waine, Mata or Greive were banging them in at club level fair enough - but they are not. McCowatt is probably the Kiwi scoring the most at a decent level.

Wood is also very experienced at drawing a pen (soft or otherwise), exhibit 'A' being the Congo game. He got terrible service against Socceroos, and Greece I can't comment as didn't see the game. Wood has also not long come off a double against Luton in the EPL. If he's fit, and gets 3-4 quality balls a game, he'll score from 1.

I'd like to see Waine & Wood together up top and see how that goes. Wood's best years were alongside Barnes at Burnley in a 2 striker system. Hay tried De Jong alongside Wood last year against Socceroos I thought it went okay.

Stephen Kenny came in and completely altered the way the Irish play with very little in the way of playing resources. He was seen as brave and had the support of many after his work with irish age grade teams and because of his style of football

3 years on and patience has worn thin. they really are awful by european standads.

We need to deviate from relying on CW. Part of the reason why I believe we are just atrocious with scoring in open play is because we're trying to force feed our attacks with him at the tail of it. International level teams can .. rather HAVE.. picked it apart day in day out. I realise we don't have proven scorers beyond him but the team needs to be a bit more unpredictable and innovative with the brand of football being played. We have Waino, Callum young men who want to step up. Why don't we find them the same Aura that CW is given? They could use that belief. Singh can score, Stamenic loves to move up when he can, MG has the flair we need the youthful energy to be given the chance to make a difference. I'd happily take a loss taking calculated risks than " pass pass pass hoof, backline howler, Ah well onwards "

As we can see from his club games Wood is capable of playing the game in many different ways and scoring different goals. 

I don’t think the problem is Wood- it’s what the game plan is behind him. 

Against Greece we had our best ball players in the middle of the park , allegedly, but couldn’t retain possession or build from the back or attack through the centre. We couldn’t get our creative players on the ball in space, we had no wingers which has been a previous and recent strength and Payne couldn’t offer width. We rarely passed with any fluidity, which we’d been able to do previously.

Our only attack was to get Libby to bomb crosses that were easily intercepted by the defense. No sweat for Greece.

Wood playing so far from support and scarcely touching the ball seems daft. It seems a given we need to get more players making runs into the box.

Also Bazeley doesn’t seem to be able to react to match circumstances which is fairly important if we’re getting dominated in some areas. 

I think we’ll see a substantially different effort against Ireland and can judge better after that.

No beach vibe in Dublin.

📌 Day one in Dublin 🇮🇪 pic.twitter.com/kRlZkOWvzl

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 19, 2023

The winning team in Dublin training 🎖️🇮🇪 pic.twitter.com/kuM9CApAxV

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 19, 2023

As much as some of us believe Wood should be benched its simply not going to happen so its a case of who plays around him. I'd go with Grieve, quick, elusive at times and always busy off the ball. We need some spark up top that will occupy opposition defenders. Then Bring Waine on for Wood. But yeah with WOOD genuinely injured its a good chance to try a different combo but yeah Wood will play because....no i wont say it.

We have to beat this Irish B side, they are poor with even their top team. I think its doom and gloom if we cant get a result....im not buying into this 2026 judgment day only bs.

coochiee

No beach vibe in Dublin.

📌 Day one in Dublin 🇮🇪 pic.twitter.com/kRlZkOWvzl

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 19, 2023

The winning team in Dublin training 🎖️🇮🇪 pic.twitter.com/kuM9CApAxV

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 19, 2023

I dare even the most foolhardy to go to the beach in Dublin in November

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/nz-teams/133317798/all-whites-looking-to-be-more-clinical-in-both-boxes-against-republic-of-ireland

Grinding in Dublin 🇮🇪🇳🇿 pic.twitter.com/olKZ19aPw6

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 20, 2023

Final session before matchday 🇮🇪🇳🇿 pic.twitter.com/2l65RF47fT

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 20, 2023

Almost 4 years to the day. Ryan Thomas's last AWs appearance.

The All Whites last played Republic of Ireland in 2019 🇮🇪🇳🇿

Callum McCowatt made his international debut in the match and marked it with a goal on debut ✨ pic.twitter.com/Qz7DoJ1Jbn

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 20, 2023

Celebrating Finn Surman’s first All Whites cap after making his senior international debut against 🇬🇷 last week 👏🇳🇿 pic.twitter.com/9af91fq9CS

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 21, 2023

If Crocombe isn't in goal, he'll probably never make himself available for the AWs again.

https://www.nzfootball.co.nz/newsarticle/135251?newsfeedId=1275622

Likely Team:
Bazeley is set to stick with his preferred 4-3-3 formation but, as highlighted before the Greece game, he expects to make some changes to the starting line-up.

In the last match he started Tyler Bindon and Tommy Smith as his centre-back pair together for the first time so could be keen to give one of his other options, such as Michael Boxall, Nando Pijanker or Finn Surman, a chance to impress in Dublin. 

Chris Wood confirmed in the pre-match press conference he feels he will able to play longer than the 45 minutes he managed against Greece after continuing to return to form after injury. 

In goal, Alex Paulsen is in brilliant form for Wellington Phoenix but is uncapped at international level. Could this be his chance to stake his claim?


Player to Watch: Evan Ferguson
One of the hottest properties in European football? Brighton’s 19-year-old striker is tipped to go to the very top of the game and has scored 5 goals in 11 Premier League games so far this season.

After having to leave the pitch with an injury in Republic of Ireland’s last game, the question will be if he is fit to start at home against the All Whites.

Not long now until the All Whites take on @IrelandFootball in their final game of 2023 🇳🇿🇮🇪

📖 Read our preview at https://t.co/kUwo2PcOxZ

▶️ Watch live and free in NZ on FIFA+ and @TVNZ from 8:45am [NZT] at https://t.co/TLNJQYTVv1

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 21, 2023

coochiee

Almost 4 years to the day. Ryan Thomas's last AWs appearance.

The All Whites last played Republic of Ireland in 2019 🇮🇪🇳🇿

Callum McCowatt made his international debut in the match and marked it with a goal on debut ✨ pic.twitter.com/Qz7DoJ1Jbn

— New Zealand Football 🇳🇿 (@NZ_Football) November 20, 2023

“4 white shirts in the middle…”

Here it is. Good to see Crocombe and Boxall there, would have liked to see Surman or Bindon get a start.

image.png 76.24 KB

That’s about as strong an All Whites starting squad as we could hope for. My only question mark is over Pijnaker but hoping he can prove me wrong.

yep no excuses. They need to put in a good performance. 

anyone's tvnz+ not working?
having to watch it on fifa+.

interesting to see Ireland in black? why not their normal green?

4-2-3-1 set up. Doesn't look too bad to start with tbh.

Ireland happy to run at players and work the overlaps, while we're looking to get it down the flanks and pass in to space. Pretty good tempo to the game so far for a friendly as well.

Surprising how lethargic we look. Bit sloppy but not outmatched. Maybe it’s all the golf lol

Under the pump

Ranix

Under the pump

All at sea defensively down Tim Payne's side. Johnston having a bit of a field day...

Tough watch so far. We have barely had the ball. And when we do max 2 passes. 

Ireland are controlling well from the back but not really creating much. 

Devolving into an awful showing

Fudge off Pijnaker. 

Disgrace.

Absolutely fudgeing useless

That dispossession leading to the goal sums up the performance so far very well.

Got the Standard Pijnaker clanger out of the way now.

Three more years of this fellas. Buckle up