Republic of Ireland vs Italy: Martin O'Neill hails spirit of the Irish after the greatest win of his career

O'Neill believes his side's ability to score late goals shows they have the character to take on anyone at Euro 2016

Martin O'Neill described the victory over Italy as the greatest of his football career (Getty)

Martin O’Neill declared on Wednesday night that his Republic of Ireland side’s victory over Italy was the greatest of his managerial career and when asked about France, their opponents in the round of 16, replied: “Easy! We will have a think about it when we are going home. I don’t really want to think this is the end for us.”

Italy manager Antonio Conte said that the Irish had not deserved to win but O’Neill disagreed, after Robbie Brady’s header four minutes from time had given the team the win they needed to progress beyond the group stage of a European Championship for the first time. “I didn’t realise [it was our first] so that in itself is really, really great,” he said. “To come out of the group we were in is an amazing achievement because Italy are no Pot 2 team.”

He said that the players had been devastated not to be awarded what looked like a strong penalty appeal just before half-time, when they arrived for the interval. “There was real disappointment in the dressing-room after the penalty. After a moment’s deliberation we took heart from that and thought ‘yes we can go.’”

Asked how he had managed to advance so far with a squad lacking a wealth of Premier League players and who have a habit of scoring late in games, the manager said: “I think I’m reasonably good at my job. When we come together we try and have to neutralise some of the advantages that their team have then we have to go positively. If it means you have to raise your game, so be it.”

O’Neill also had a sharp rebuttal for the former Republic of Ireland manager Marco Tardelli, who claimed earlier this week that the Irish side struggle with tactics and don’t understand the “intellectual” side of the game. “Marco [also] said that they didn’t play with a lot of passion but that performance tonight might have put that to bed for a day or two,” O’Neill said.

Of Sunday’s game against France in Lyon, he said: “It’s a great game for us because we are playing a host nation and France are very strong. They will be strong favourites to beat us. We have got there and if recover in time we want to play as strongly as we did tonight. Naturally we will need to. It is an immense test and now we are looking forward to it immensely.

“We dominated for long periods of the game and played some incredible stuff. We showed great spirit. Spirit alone will not win games, though. You have to show ability. Some players have come of age. We do keep going. The players know and never give up. We have some late goals to our credit. Seriously when [we score late goals] so often it can’t be a coincidence. I know I don’t look it but I am absolutely thrilled.”

Man of the match Robbie Brady said of his 86th minute winner: “I can’t explain the feeling. The people who describe this say it’s an out of body experience. I was feeling that tonight. I don’t know what to say. My head has gone a bit. This is a two-year process to get here. It was difficult to play a [strong] Italian side. We’ve managed to beat some of the best sides in the world so we’ve nothing to fear going into the weekend. We can play anybody if we click like we clicked tonight.”

Ireland celebrate their late victory in front of their vocal support (Getty)

The supplier of the goal, Wes Hoolahan, had just missed a cast-iron opportunity when he supplied the cross. “It caught under his feet but it’s the sort of man he is that he [recovered] to put it right on my head,” Brady said. “It was our last chance to put ourselves through. They had players who could hurt us. We had it all tonight. Don’t get me wrong we has some luck they struck the post. We got the result we deserved, so roll on France.”