Teema: U-17 National Team Discussion.

This thread is for discussion about the Irish U-17 National Team.

Congrats to Damyard on becoming the new U-17 boss!

I'm sure everyone would like to hear how you are going to proceed for the season.

Hello I am an assistant to your selection

Hey everyone!

I'm sorry for not responding sooner, I only saw this now! But thank you Emerald and everyone else who voted!

I went through pretty much every single U17 player from Ireland on the site, including players from leagues outside Ireland and conveniently was left with 35 players with an OR of at least 500, which is the maximum amount of players in a national squad. I also assigned SAJ123 as the assistant because they put forward a good candidacy presentation and had researched the youth players of Ireland.

I feel like both of the goalkeepers in the squad are solid goalkeepers, with similar abilities. There is also great strength and depth in defense and midfield. However, there is a real problem with offense, with Liam Neeson (of SANDECJA) being pretty indispensable for our attack. For this reason, and also because many of the other nations are slightly stronger, I feel like it'd be for the best if we played a formation which provided strength in defense, rather than offense, for example a 5-4-1, or a 4-5-1, which I've used in both of the matches as coach so far and it has worked well. Over the next couple of friendlies I will be trying a handful of new tactics and formations to try see which is best for our U17 team. I will hopefully be able to have several tactics which I will be able to alternate between in order to try beat easier and equal skilled opposition to us, and grind out some wins against tougher opposition.

I hope I can do the nation proud and try raise some great players who will hopefully go on to be successful with the senior team in several years time!

I really do appreciate our NT's managers coming into these threads and taking the time to post their blueprint going forward.

And yes, 2 very good results so far, especially v Belgium as they were at home and far superior to our team.

~

One of my pet hates though, and I've vented my spleen over this a few times in these forums over the last couple of seasons, is the waste of energy in friendly NT games.

It may not seem much, playing V.High for both halves wastes .6 player energy compared to .04 playing V. Low. But if your team plays 7 friendly games on V. High, that is 4.2 energy lost, compared to a NT who plays 7 games on V.Low, using only .28 energy.

If both teams come up against each other in a Qualifier/European Championship/World Cup then it's very easy to see what team has a greater edge right off the bat.

It's all very well going unbeaten in a single season playing V. High in every game, but not winning many competitive matches is the main problem.

My advice to you is to conserve energy where you can, and use it where it counts most.
Playing V. High in friendly games and not getting beaten will not impress the club managers in our country.
Go out and try to win in the competitive games.
Friendly games, after all, mean absolutely nothing.

With all that said, good luck Damyard!

Jim Folan

Hey everyone!

Today was a bad day for our U17s. As has been the case since I took over, we're just not strong in attack and particularly weak at shooting. Last week we had a disappointing 3-1 loss against Belgium, however, we actually played well and put in a good performance. We simply were just not clinical in front of goal, shooting wide more times than Belgium had overall shots in the whole game.

I've spent some time playing with substitutions and formation changes during the game. I think this will be an effective tactic because we'll probably spend most of the match defending, and try score a late winner using counter attacking substitutes towards the end of the match.

On to some good news; I'm happy to announce that one of our strikers, Odhran Devlin, has been through training camp and has really improved massively enough to take a lot of the emphasis off Liam Neeson. While it's great that we no longer depend on one attacker, it's worth mentioning that these two players are by far the weakest in the team.

Regards

Ireland U-17's are always going to be weak due to the very little teams in our country.

On top of that, there are only a few teams with top facilities required to churn out top quality prospects, which means this youth team won't be very successful for the foreseeable future.

It's all about perspective really.

While it's nice to get a few results here and there the reality is the U-17's will struggle against most, if not all other nations.

Essentially, it's a platform for the top players to come through to the U-20's and eventually the Senior NT.

You can only do your best Damyard, and so far that is what you have done!

Thanks for the update too.

Hello all,

I would like to announce that I will not be putting myself forward for re-election of the U17 manager for next season. I have enjoyed building the experience with the U17s, however I wish to shift my focus and attention towards rebuilding my club team. I will try to put together the strongest team possible for the upcoming World Cup qualifying matches, and make the qualifying job for the next manager as easy as possible.

I wish my successor, whomever it may be, the very best of luck with the team and will happily help them out if ever they need advice with managing the team.

Regards

We opened up our World Cup qualifying campaign today against Estonia U17. We played a great game against a team who have stronger stats than we do. In the end, we drew 0-0, but had a goal disallowed for offside. I feel it was a massively encouraging display because not only did we keep a clean sheet, but we made more chances than our opposition and were able to hit the target a lot more than what we have done in recent friendlies.

All in all, we put in a strong performance and I'm happy we came out with a clean sheet, although, I feel like we could - and maybe deserved to - have got 3 points from this game. But it's definitely a strong start, and I know that if we continue this solid defending and accurate attacking that we'll definitely put up some good results before long.

Éire Abú!

Today, we faced a difficult task of playing Hungary. I took a look at their previous matches, particularly their loses, and tried to learn everything I could to try get something from this match. I adjusted the team to what I think would make a difference and increase our chances of nicking a point or three from a team that could fairly easily win by 3 or 4 if we didn't turn up with our A-game.

We started off well, going into the half-time break 1-0 up. Unfortunately, we just didn't come out in the second half and conceded two half way into the second half and by this stage, Hungary had made defensive changes, making them far more stronger at the back, especially for our pretty weak attack.

Overall, a pretty good 2-1 defeat to a team much stronger than us, along with a few positives to take from the game, those being; we scored and played well in the first half. It's just very deflating losing a game we were winning.

Ryley Gleeson
5/6 but he have very nice Q

The U-17 manager has been contacted regarding his absence, he came back online yesterday for the first time since April.

I am awaiting a response.

So I have received no reply from the U-17 manager, and there is nothing we can do until the mid-season elections when someone else can be appointed.

A great shame.

If anybody would like to take over the Irish U-17 NT please contact Vlady.

He might be able to help.