Heimir Hallgrimsson declares himself happy with his team’s progress since last England game

Macdara Ferris reports from Wembley

The 2-0 defeat in Dublin to England the last time the sides met wasn’t the start that Heimir Hallgrimsson wanted to his reign as Ireland boss. Indeed the scoreline didn’t reflect the dominance of the English in that fixture.

However, fast forward to the final game of this UEFA Nations League campaign and Hallgrimsson was declaring himself happy when asked by extratime.com in Wembley where his team is at since that loss.

"Good progress, I would say,” said Heimir Hallgrimsson. “Of course I’m biased. Hopefully, we can show that tomorrow, that we will play better, be more organised and be more compact than we were in Dublin.

 "I’m quite happy and the second camp was really good even though we didn’t win the game against Greece (losing 2-0) we played well, especially in the second half.

"And even though they had domination in the first half, we didn’t concede, and that is something we need to build on.”

His team won in Finland during that second camp and got another victory against the same opposition last week even if they were a bit fortuitous against the Finns in the Aviva. 

England are of course a different proposition particularly as they are still seeking a win to confirm their promotion to League A.

“We know what kind of threat England gives us and if we are not ready from the first minute, they will punish us,” said the Ireland boss.

"It kind of happened in Dublin; they made a pass through the centre of our team and scored an easy goal.

"It’s a team that if we give them a chance they will probably take it. They have such an attacking quality in that team, but there are weaknesses as well, so we are going to try to exploit them.

“England have hired a new coach (German manager Thomas Tuchel will replace Lee Carsley after this fixture) and they want to win the World Cup, so that is kind of the difference where we are at this moment.” 

With third place in the group already guaranteed for the Boys in Green, a play-off to stay in League B will come in March before the World Cup qualifiers begin in the autumn.  

"If we want to qualify (for the 2026 World Cup), we know we will have two nations above us in the FIFA rankings, two seeded teams above us, and if we want to qualify we need points against the big nations at home or away.

"So this is a good dress rehearsal for that campaign that starts in September."

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— extratime.com (@extratime.bsky.social) 16 November 2024 at 20:15