Staying positive: Giovanni Trapattoni says Ireland can still qualify for the knock out stages

‘It was a tough game and the two goals killed us: one before half-time and the one afterwards was the killer blow. It was always going to be tough from there.’

World champions Spain, who opened the day with a 1-1 draw with Italy, are up next on
Thursday in Gdansk and Trapattoni will be under pressure to change his line-up after
Croatia’s comfortable win, which could have been considerably worse.

Trapattoni stuck with the side he named a week ago but his bizarre substitutions failed to turn the game in Ireland’s favour.

The Italian threw on strikers Shane Long and Jon Walters eventually, with Kevin Doyle and Robbie Keane both struggling to get anything out of the Croatian defence.

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