Martin O'Neill: We are not the most talented outfit but we have a great spirit

Martin O’Neill and Jon Walters took their seats at this morning’s pre-match press conference as Ireland prepare for their crunch top of the table clash against Serbia at the Aviva Stadium tomorrow night.

In injury news, Jeff Hendrick has been ruled out of tomorrow night’s game whilst Wes Hoolahan and Aiden McGeady are also doubts for the game but are expected to pull through and play a part.

The Irish manager was asked about how his side could improve his performance from the disappointing performance against Georgia on Saturday night with Martin being quite motivated to rectify the problems from Saturday night’s performance.

“No, of course, we've got to try and analyse the game itself. We made a few mistakes where we could have done better and we will go on from then, watch the DVD on how Serbia play and we will build our game plan from there.

“I think that we conceded possession against Georgia too easily and we never seemed to get it back and when we did, I thought we didn’t use it to our advantage. Second half I thought we were a bit better and the Irony of it all is we had some great chances to win the game.”

O’Neill also had his take on if the game is a must win for Serbia and if the performances against the likes of Germany in the last qualification campaign and Italy in the European Championships last summer can offer extra motivation and belief to the players.

“We have three games left and are a couple of points behind Serbia. We will, of course, go out and try to win the game.

“I think that's exactly what we can do. We have had some great nights here at the Aviva: Germany and Bosnia, the two that come to mind and particular fightbacks we have had. These are things that we should be thinking about before tomorrow night.”

“At the end of it all, the players in the last couple of seasons have great determination. We have had games where we have had not much of the ball and we seem to find a way of turning it around.”

The Irish boss was also quizzed about Jeff Hendrick and his race for fitness for tomorrow night’s game.

“He did some work with the medical team. He's still feeling it a bit going into tomorrow. It’s risky to go full throttle so he will miss out on tomorrow night.

“We want to try and get on the front foot that’s the most important thing we are playing against a talented side with a lot of ability with big players playing in big leagues and we want to try and match their level.

"Over the years I think there have been strong Irish performances, certainly at the Aviva in my time. We might have gone through spells where things have not worked out for us and we have fought through, like when Jon (Walters) scored against Austria when we were second best for most of that game.”

Walters was also asked if fatigue play a factor in tomorrow night’s game against the Serbians after the long travel they have had from Tbilisi.

“I think people are only making a fuss about it because of the result. The last couple of game have been difficut. The group was never going to be pain sailing. We are always going to be competitive, even if the likes of Spain, Italy and Germany especially, who didn’t exactly run away with the group, we will always be competitive I feel.

“We will have the same mentality going into the Serbia game and hopefully we will come out with the three points tomorrow night.”

O’Neil was then asked about his team’s chances of a top two finish in the group and also if there is a fear factor developing amongst the Irish squad.

“We are fighting, we are unbeaten in the group, surprisingly to some people, and we are going to try and do two things: Win the game, [and] if we can’t do that, we will try and get something out of the game. But first and foremost, we will try and win it.

“If we win the game we set ourselves up for a grandstand finish in the final two games in October against Moldova and Wales.

“We scored after two minutes so we have 88 plus added time to play out, I wouldn’t call that going into your shell, we have played over 20 games competitively and I think it’s once that we have gone in front and got beaten which was against France.

“We have been without top quality players throughout the campaign at different stages, we have Seamus Coleman recovering from a broken leg, and we can cope all the time.

"It does not matter if they are stronger or not. We have a game on our hands we will try and do our upmost to win. We are not the most talented outfit but we have great spirit and I am sure that will help us tomorrow night.