The Ireland Women’s National Team will continue their quest to qualify for EURO 2025 by taking on Georgia in Round 1 of the Play-Offs in October.
They met in qualifying for the 2023 World Cup when Ireland won 11-0 at Tallaght Stadium in November 2021 and then 9-0 in Gori in Georgia the following June.
Katie McCabe scored five goals across the two games and Denise O’Sullivan four but nobody will take anything for granted.
They qualified as runners up to Turkey in League C with three wins and no goals conceded in those wins in their last four games.
It would be a major surprise but then again so was Ireland’s three – one win over France.
If that hurdle is overcome it will then be either Slovakia or Cymru for a place in the Finals to take place next Summer.
Northern Ireland face a tougher task with a two legged tie against Croatia to navigate, in order to get to a second round tie against Norway or Albania, likely to be the former.
“Having completed a difficult Group stage, where we played three of the top six teams in the world, we have learned a lot and will be stronger for it,” said Eileen Gleeson Republic of Ireland Manager. “The target for us since last year, when we started with the UEFA Nations League, was always to qualify for EURO 2025; this is the next part of that.”
“We will take confidence from our win over France in Cork but also from each of our six performances in the Group stage. It is important that we improve with each game if we are to compete at the top level of women’s football. And we will be ready for these Play-Offs.”
“We were pretty confident no matter who we drew, from our point of view, given the momentum we have at the moment,” added Tanya Oxtoby, manager of Northern Ireland.
“We are really pleased and ready to get going again.”
She explained everyone in the Northern Ireland camp is really positive following some good performances in the last two international windows, including wins over Malta and Bosnia and Herzegovina in the latest window this month.
“We need to continue to execute what we do and continue to challenge ourselves. The group is ready for this and we continue to grow.” she said.
The Northern Ireland manager admitted she had “half an eye” on round two of the play-offs, however she added: “We need to focus on the Croatia games. We will look at the second round if and when we get there.”
Oxtoby revealed the players believe they can make their mark in the play-offs, especially as performances have been getting better and better.
“It would mean the world to everyone to reach the Euros again,” she added.
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