Troy Parrott had two goals disallowed as the Republic of Ireland played out a stalemate against North Macedonia on the night on which they had hoped to book a trip to the World Cup finals.<\/p>\n
Five days after their dreams came to an end for another four years in Prague, Ireland drew 0-0 with the Macedonians in a friendly encounter neither side wanted as the Czech Republic and Denmark fought for the big prize.<\/p>\n
Even a third successive home victory for the first time since the 2015-16 campaign would have provided scant consolation for Thursday night’s disappointment but Heimir Hallgrimsson’s men had to make do with a disappointing draw.<\/p>\n
AZ Alkmaar striker Parrott came closest to breaking the deadlock as 37-year-old defender Seamus Coleman received a standing ovation from a crowd of 39,560 at the Aviva Stadium when he was replaced during the second half of what could yet prove to be his final appearance for his country.<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, the squad will reconvene for a series of friendlies at the end of the season ahead of next season’s Nations League campaign and later Euro 2028 qualification having restored a measure of pride and established a momentum they hope will serve them well when they return to competitive action.<\/p>\n
The hosts went on to the offensive from the off, although they were unable to find the final ball to allow either Parrott or Chiedozie Ogbene to threaten.<\/p>\n
John Egan could not direct an 11th-minute corner at goal and Ogbene saw his snapshot deflected over three minutes later, but goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher had to parry Enis Bardhi’s 21st-minute free-kick after it flicked off the defensive wall, with Bardhi volleying high over after the resulting corner had been only half-cleared.<\/p>\n
Macedonia keeper Stole Dimitrievski saved Parrott’s 23rd-minute header comfortably after Dara O’Shea and Finn Azaz had sparked a concerted attack, and Azaz failed to make the most of a free-kick two minutes later after he had been tripped just outside the penalty area.<\/p>\n
Parrott was played into a promising position by Knight nine minutes before the break, only to miss the target by some distance.<\/p>\n
The in-form striker – he scored his sixth goal in three games in Prague – might have done better again two minutes later after Azaz’s clipped pass had caused problems for the Macedonian defence but he snatched at his attempt and fired high and wide.<\/p>\n
Parrott twice had the ball in the net as time ran down but an offside flag stalled his celebrations on each occasion.<\/p>\n
Ireland were unfortunate not to take the lead with 52 minutes gone when Azaz accepted Seamus Coleman’s pass and found Parrott, who turned smartly before shooting against the upright.<\/p>\n
Azaz curled an effort just wide and Tihomir Kostadinov denied Parrott a clear run on goal as the hosts began to turn the screw but it was veteran Coleman’s 61st-minute departure as
Hallgrimsson made changes which attracted the biggest cheer of the night to that point.<\/p>\n
Wholesale changes did not help the flow of the game, which rather petered out as the whistle approached, although Ireland substitute Johnny Kenny passed up a glorious opportunity to win it at the end with a weak shot at the keeper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Troy Parrott had two goals disallowed as the Republic of Ireland played out a stalemate against North Macedonia…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":["post-375610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}