Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Hendrick vow as Republic face major struggle
REPUBLIC of Ireland midfielder Jeff Hendrick has promised the team will fight until the bitter end of a World Cup qualifying campaign which seems destined to end in disappointment.
Ireland lie in fourth place in Group A after Tuesday night’s 1-1 home draw with Serbia, a full 11 points adrift of leaders Portugal, nine behind the Serbs and four adrift of Luxembourg with just three games to play.
It would take a remarkable turn of events for Stephen Kenny’s men, who face a trip to Azerbaijan next month and then a double-header against Portugal and Luxembourg in November, to snatch a playoff place, but Hendrick and his team-mates have no intention of throwing in the towel.
The Newcastle midfielder said: “It’s going to be tough now, but we approach it positively.
“If you look at Portugal (2-1 loss last Wednesday), we had a gameplan – I think it worked very well. We were minutes away from a very good result.
“That result improves our confidence.
“It’s a bit late and it’s hard to get something out of this group, but like any Irish team, we’ll keep going and give it our all.”
Things might have looked very different had Cristiano Ronaldo’s late double in Faro last week not got Portugal out of jail, with Ireland leading 1-0 at the Estadio Algarve as the clock ticked towards the final minute of normal time.
It was they who struck at the death both against Azerbaijan three days later when Shane Duffy’s 87th-minute equaliser snatched a 1-1 draw, and against Serbia as Nikola Milenkovic’s own goal four minutes from time cancelled out Sergej MilinkovicSavic’s first-half opener.