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13th June 2016
10:59pm BST

The midfield diamond was gleaming. Glenn Whelan was shielding Ibrahimovic from his team-mates, Jeff Hendrick almost scored two worldies and Wes Hoolahan was dazzling. Only James McCarthy seemed a little off the pace, which may be explained by the injury that has upset his preparations.
Up front Shane Long manfully did the running of two men as a patently unfit Jon Walters struggled to make his usual, high-octane mark on the game.
There were wobbles early on from Coleman, but for the most part the defence held firm.
The worst you can say about captain John O'Shea was that he should have scored in the first half.
Ciaran Clark was unfortunate to see a fine performance sullied by an own goal which, like all own goals, is hard to explain after the fact.
No one goes out with the thought of turning the ball into their own net. Shit just happens.
Shit happened to Belgium not long after Coleman, McCarthy, Brady and the rest had boarded the bus back to Versailles.
The number one ranked team in the world, a squad packed with talent from some of the biggest clubs in Europe, were beaten 2-0 by an Italian team who are not considered the greatest Azzurri to ever don the famous blue.
What Italy do have, however, is a good manager. In Antonio Conte they have the man that Roman Abramovich is trusting with picking up the post-Mourinho pieces at Chelsea. In Marc Wilmots Belgium have a manager who cannot make the greatest generation of Belgian footballers add up to the sum of their parts.
So star quality isn't everything. A good manager is. While there are still reservations about O'Neill's substitutions - no one can say Aiden McGeady, Robbie Keane or James McClean made a tangible difference - he has undoubtedly hewn a team from the materials available to him.
The loss of Walters will test O'Neill's team-building abilities but, a win against a disjointed, defensively inept Belgium team would secure Ireland's progress to the second round.
https://twitter.com/SportsJOEdotie/status/742474876670332928
Maybe then those Germans would recognise Coleman or, maybe not. But they'll recognise a team when they see one.

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