European Championship Qualifier
13.09.2014 at 15:00 - Staffanstorp, Staffanstorp , Sweden
AFTER their run to the semi-final of last season’s UEFA WU19 Championships, the Republic of Ireland Women’s U19 side play their first qualifying round of the new campaign in Sweden tomorrow.
Dave Connell’s side will look to get off to a winning start when they meet Montenegro in Staffanstorp (2.00pm Irish). Moldova and the hosts Sweden are their other opponents. The 11 group winners and the ten runners-up with the best records against the sides first and third in their section will join the three top seeds – Germany, England and France – in the elite round. Seven teams will eventually qualify for the finals in Israel, alongside the hosts.
“We’re going well in training. Everything is fine here. We’ve rested Savannah McCarthy for last few days as a precaution but she’ll be ok,” said Connell.
“It’s warm enough out here but it’s similar enough to back home so the conditions won’t be a factor.
“We’ve gone through some small info that we have on Montenegro but nothing comprehensive. This is the sort of game where we’re looking to ourselves and we want to step up to the mark.”
After their glorious run during the summer, a memorable campaign came to an end with a semi-final loss to Netherlands and last month Connell’s new batch suffered two losses to Denmark in friendly games so he wants the winning mentality to return this week.
“We took players who’d be on the fringes in recent years to Denmark – it worked out for some and not for others but we’re confident we can come out of this group,” he said.
“We’ve worked hard on certain aspects of our game. We want to get off to a good start.
“Defence was the foundation of the team last year and we’ve let that slip a little in our last three games. We’ll get back to basics tomorrow and will aim to keep things tight and look to score a couple ourselves.”
REPUBLIC OF IRELAND:
Brooke Dunne (Peamount Utd)
Caoimhe O’Reilly (UCD Waves)
Savannah McCarthy (UCD Waves)
Keeva Keenan (Raheny United)
Lauren Dwyer (Raheny United)
Shannon Carson (Cork City Women’s FC)
Aisling Frawley (Wexford Youths)
Hayley Nolan (Peamount Utd)
Lisa Casserly (Galway WFC)
Roma McLaughlin (Greencastle)
Niamh Nelson (San Diego)
Megan Connolly (College Corinthians)
Jess Gargan (Peamount Utd)
Ciara McNamara (Cork City Women’s FC)
Emma Byrne (Peamount Utd)
Rachel Doyle (Peamount Utd)
Amber Barrett (Castlebar Celtic)
Rebekah Carroll (UCD Waves)
FIXTURES
Saturday, September 13
UEFA WU19 Championships Qualifying round Group 6
Republic of Ireland v Montenegro, Staffanstorp (2.00pm Irish)
Monday, September 15
UEFA WU19 Championships Qualifying round Group 6
Moldova v Republic of Ireland, Vilans IP, Kristianstad (2.00pm Irish)
Thursday, September 18
UEFA WU19 Championships Qualifying round Group 6
Republic of Ireland v Sweden, Staffanstorp (1.00pm Irish)
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