Ins and Outs. Republic of Ireland manager Vera Pauw has some fresh decisions to make. Decisions she had not anticipated ahead of announcing the World Cup squad next Thursday.
Suddenly, Claire O’Riordan has leapt from the standby list to defensive rock. The Celtic centre-half even headed the second Irish goal in this 3-2 defeat of a powerful Zambia outfit.
O’Riordan’s goal on 63 minutes allowed 5,732 mostly screaming girls to break all decibels levels around Tallaght.
“The medical team told me Claire wants to go on,” said Ireland manager Vera Pauw, “she does not want to go off. She wants to finish the game, so we put her up front where she’d be less under pressure.
“Actually, it is a position she has played before.”
So O’Riordan changed the conversation? “If you talk about Claire, she has done everything herself. She was on the fringe, actually not selected but because of her last games at Celtic, and especially her cup final, I saw that her best performance is the norm.
“And her best performance was against Rangers, and her best performance told us she was part of the squad. The way she has trained has been phenomenal. We knew what she could do but she had to grow and be in control.
“In the first half she had a fear of failure. I said in dressingroom that ‘if you have a fear of failure you will never succeed. Open up. Have the guts to make mistakes because otherwise we don’t get anywhere.’”
[ Amber Barrett at the double as she comes to Ireland’s rescue against ZambiaOpens in new window ]
The entire Ireland team seemed frozen by fear.
“Well the pressure was so high and Zambia are so fast and physically strong,” Pauw agreed. “Everybody picked it up in the second half. We started playing to score, not playing not to lose the ball.
“They are coachable. We showed them three good clips of what was happening on the pitch.”
Sports psychology is a tool most elite athletes tap into. There are plenty of faith healers on the circuit but whatever mind control Pauw has tapped into, it is working.
“I am very proud of how all the players handled this situation because there was huge pressure on individual performances. We have given them tools for the moment they are getting out of themselves and judging themselves, we showed them how to deal with that.
“We played the game and were not busy with ourselves.”
Amber Barrett booked her flight to Brisbane next month, shuffling off the bench to convert a penalty before grabbing a second goal to nail down this Irish victory. She had not scored since Hampden Park.
“We have worked on that, specifically to make sure this was Amber’s moment. Because, as she says herself, you cannot rely on one goal. I am so pleased for her.”
