Probably 3rd but I think we have a decent chance of getting 2nd.  If we have 9 or 10 points after 4 games which we should have then momentum is gathering on our side and it will go down to the wire between us and the Swiss or Denmark.

I think we are capapble of getting 2nd.  Our squad is sh*te but if we are well set up with a good happy camp under Mick then we will be respectable against anyone.

MON had morale rock bottom and played anti-football and was able to get draws against the Danes.  I can't see why a better set up EIRE with better tactics and team spirit can't at least match that.

9 points was always the bare minimum to have any outside chance of qualifying though. The Gibraltar games will give people a massive false impression of what is happening in the group table.

Now if we get a result against Denmark, that's a totally different story. I'll take back every word I've said.

We effectively have 6 matches in this group. Georgia at home being the easiest. All the meat and bones of our group comes in 6 months time. I must do up a table without any Gibraltar results in it, as they give a silly impression of how we are doing. Especially come the summer time when we will have played then twice.

This 

But If MoN had been still in charge, I would have voted for 'no chance', it had got that bad.

We should beat Georgia away in October and will beat Gib at home.

that leaves four matches, home and away against denmark and switzerland, drawing all four of these would be enough for second, if there is a winner in the danes vs swiss return game in october.  

Would be surprised if it's any different to this. 

We did f**k up over there in September 2017.

Exactly - we were absolute muck, getting rid of the ball asap and making them look like Barcelona. 

 

I'd be a bit more hopeful we can avoid such a farce this year for the simple reason that we've got rid of MONROY and the toxic atmosphere that had set in during their last year.

MON got 2 scoreless draws in Denmark. Surely anything less than a point is a backwards step

The second one wasn't even a friendly. A nothing game.

Think you've stuck this link in the wrong thread tbh but still:

 

Now, I know that link is from a God-awful sh*t-stirring rag but I wouldn't be surprised if this story is true.  I think I mentioned that the €100k 'loan' was 2 years ago and that there could be more scandals/revelations still to emerge in relation to subsequent accounting years to that one.  And now, lo and behold...

Nothing has changed for me

A Nations League group as long as we  take 12 from 12 against Georgia and Gibraltar 

Think we will be there it thereabouts. 

Watched back the Eamon Dunphy interview with Mick on YouTube and Mick just seems like the type of bloke you would love to play for . Don’t think we will be an easy team to beat under him .

A few things he said stuck out , talking about playing bigger teams he said he would hunt down the chief and f**king let’s have em. Dunphy kept goo back to how good Ireland’s football was under him last time and he said he knows we can’t try play like that all the time and we need to get f**king stuck in from time to time .

He also mentioned how he though big jack was a head of the game with how he set Ireland up back then and how everyone knew exactly their job going out in the pitch . I think he is going to have us set to know exactly what we need to do in every match . 

Just have a good feeling about this campaign and think we can do it

Oh great a f**king comedian 

We had fewer shots on target against Georgia in Dublin than we had in Tbilisi in the heavily criticised 1-1 under O'Neill. However the games were night and day. The game in Lansdowne was how we expect an Irish team to play. 

So things have changed. The O'Neill era is now irrelevant as a guide to future performances.

A Danish World Cup hangover is very possible. A previous one helped us qualify for USA 94. 

Luck has always played apart in qualifying for tournaments, no matter the quality of the Ireland team.

How the group looks with a Danish hangover

.....................P....W...D...L...Pts

Switzerland...4....1....3...0...6

Ireland..........4....1....2...1...5

Denmark.......4....0....3...1...3

Living the dream! 

Confidence is rising after the 1-1 (the National Result) in Copenhagen.

So confusing

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_Euro_2020_qualifying_play-offs" rel="nofollow - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_Euro_2020_qualifying_play-offs

Hope for a few League A teams not to qualify (eg Iceland) and the League B teams ahead of us to auto qualify. 

With Slovakia and Wales in the same group and Croatia back on track by beating Wales today, we need every other league B to qualify for us to get a home draw (which would be against the north) in the playoffs, so Austria need to get their act together.

Most likely will be away to Slovakia.

And Wales just got one back - Cheering Wales on feels 🤮 

Yep. Other hope is having Iceland as the only League A team that doesn’t qualify (or having all League A teams qualify) and then having 4 League B teams ahead of us not qualify so we get into the League A playoffs which would be watered down massively and be more like League C.  

It has been a brilliant game to watch.

Cmon the mighty Magyars

Said it at the time as I felt our best chance was to sneak 2nd ahead of Denmark by drawing with them home and away but taking more points from the Switzerland games than Denmark.

Still possible for us to achieve that but Im not confident at all. We need Switzerland to win in Denmark, yet not win in Dublin, tough to realistically have any confidence in that happening.

The Swiss and the Danes have better squads than us on paper, but we've been in that situation before. I'd say its the flip of a coin in it, in terms of our chances at the end of the group landing in the top 2.

Draw puts pressure on the Swiss. They had some pretty bad finishing vs Portugal and while they’re a good team top to bottom, not having a superstar could help. 

A flip of a coin? Really? 

The Swiss are around evens to win the group, the Danes around 6/4 and we are around 9/2. I would say that is more accurate than suggesting we are evens to finish second.

I suppose that is a bit of a stretch, though i think it could be mostly draws between the top 3 in the group, with one big result being enough to see one team rise above. It does look like we really deflated Denmark with that draw, had read a couple articles online suggesting that with Hareide it might be starting to go stale, a miraculous draw in Switzerland aside. I think that could be our best bet in hoping Denmark start to go off the boil.

It would take a braver man than me to bet against the Swiss having the group won with a game to spare, though.

It wouldn't be easy but not an impossibility either. The Swiss are very good but they are not a France, NL, Germany etc

I reckon we'll draw 2 and lose 1 out of our 3 remaining games. So long as the team who beat us, in this scenario, is the same team who win in Copenhagen, we'll get 2nd!

Finishing 3rd is acceptable and realistic, I think 2nd is beyond us.

Having said that, we will need to play a million times better to take anything off the big two.

Why would we be worried about finishing 3rd? Might as well finish 5th as 3rd because playoff places were decided trough the nations league. Most likely outcome at this stage is we will go into the last game against Denmark needing a win because our goal difference will be inferior. 

"Worried" was very much tongue in cheek I thought it came across as rather obvious.

Finishing 3rd is acceptable because we're not better than Denmark or Switzerland, both are superior teams to us and I just don't think we're good enough to finish ahead of either.

It would take a mammoth effort and a huge slice of luck for us to finish in the top 2 with how we've performed thus far and given the quality of our squad.

I could be wrong but trying to get my head around it. 

Pretty much. However if 4 of the teams above us fail to qualify, we'd get put into the League A qualifiers if there are open spots. Right now, it looks like Iceland will fail to qualify, but the other league A teams look pretty strong. 

So there is a pretty good chance that we will make a play off. Fingers crossed anyway. 

Drew away to Denmark.

Both great results but the performances in 3 out the 4 games have been brutal.

I still can’t see us beating the Swiss or Denmark home or away.

We can’t score - simple.

That could be our last win in the group

Yet we have scored 5 goals

I'm still confident we'll finish in the the top 2.

I think we'll grind out a draw against the Swiss in both games, grind out another narrow win against the Georgians and will grind out another 0-0 with the Danes

I Really don't get what is laughable about that.

We're a real sh*t and tough team to break down. The Swiss are a decent team yes, but they're hardly world beaters.

We need to keep an eye on Shaqiri and track the wingbacks which I think we're capable of.

This is a team who threw away a 3 goal lead at home to Denmark (again yes a better team then us).

A team who despite probably being the better team in the game couldn't break through a Portuguese defense (albeit again better then ourselves) without a very dodgy penalty.

In both game they were out done of either set plays or on the counter, two things we've shown we are capable of doing especially via set plays.

**DISCLAIMER**

I will also add I did get an elbow to the back of the head last night during the celebrations so I may have a slight concussion

If Mick can get us to the Euros he is a genius. We have no midfield, no wingers and, with the greatest of respect to McGoldrick, our best forward runs like he has just shat himself, with a top speed of slightly forwards. 

On our day, we can draw with anybody. But we need to beat somebody decent. Bias and optimism aside, can you really see that happening?

 It's true. That or a 70 year old man who was once very fast.

 

The good news is that we don't. If we beat Georgia and avoid defeat in the other three games then all we need is a winner in the Denmark - Switzerland game. I mean, it's more than likely that we will need to, but technically it's possible for us to qualify by beating no-one of note!

The Swiss will take a minimum of four points from us.

Never mind the Swiss, the Jamaican bobsleigh team would take 6 points from us 

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

If we get 7 points, we will be finishing in the top 2. Even 5 points I'd be happy with, take it to the Denmark game

Beating Switzerland or Denmark at home looks way beyond us

Not for finishing 3rd.

But we are very likely to get a play off through the Nations League format. 

It would take about 6 teams from league A and B not to qualify automatically which looks very unlikely at this stage. 

McCarthy hasn't played in three years, a period of time that has seen him go from a talented but meek central midfielder to Keane and Brady combined. Or, as Javier would say, PLATINI.

Arter appears to have been dropped. I am still unsure whether he is just sh*t or not bothered by international football, probably a little bit of both. I would still have him over Jeff, but it is the lesser of two evils.

In fairness, Long is exactly what we need. This squad is crying out for another striker who can't score and breaks down injured walking to the shops. 

Obafemi is just a kid. There is clearly potential and I have long advocated that the campaign should be about bringing the likes of him through, but that is because I feel we are going to finish third no matter what.

A lot riding on it. We only have the one match in September unlike  Switzerland and Denmark who have 2. and given the matches they both have  we will more than likely find ourselves in 3rd place.y

 

 

I agree. This will be a huge game, it will absolutely make or break our campaign. A loss and it will be a very long way back.

Also, it would be a big blow to momentum and confidence for the final three matches. A draw would keep us very much alive and a win would be fantastic.

Pipkin wrote: We need 7 points. With our goal difference, only in the unlikeliest of scenarios, less will be good enough unfortunately - and I know it comes down to head to head first but only likely scenario is we’ll at least match the Danes here on in and then they’ll just need a score draw to qualify. It would be a miracle if we didn’t concede to them if they needed goals

Six points could well be enough to qualify from here.

If we win one of our next three games (or draw all of them), that puts us on 13. Beat Denmark and that puts us on 16.

The only way Denmark get to 16 or above is by winning all of their other games... so we'd only need them to drop points in one other game, either at home to Switzerland or away to Georgia.

I don't think that's beyond the realms of possibility. And if, for example, Denmark beat Switzerland, and we get six more points, with three against Switzerland, then we are on 16 and the maximum Switzerland are can get is also 16, so we would be on head to head against them, and that's again assuming they win all their other games, though of course they should.

Six points could well be enough without asking for much at all. Seven is basically guaranteed to be enough, barring the very unlikely series of events where we would end up on the same number of points as Denmark and Switzerland on 17... all beating Georgia, then winning one, losing one and drawing two of the four head to head games. Even then, it would go to head to head.