Katie McCabe, left, and Abbie Larkin celebrate after the Uefa Women’s Nations League A/B promotion/relegation play-off second leg in Leuven. Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile
One quickly learns the art of atonement in Leuven.
If you’ve consumed a cup of strawberries drowning in chocolate, there’s no going back. Or when you’ve supped one too many of those devilish Leffe beers the monks started brewing there 800 years ago. Ireland were forced to confront their own moment of penitence at half-time on Tuesday night. They had trailed to a goal of such singular quality that it reminded all of Belgium’s supposed superiority, as well as conceding another that served to highlight presumed Irish inadequacy.