Republic Of Ireland

Ireland are a very decent team and no side will have it easy when playing against them but they are likely to lack the quality when it comes to the bigger games, something which showed when Ireland were beaten at home by Russia in qualifying. Spain and Italy are better teams than Russia and Ireland would have to get some very favourable results from those two games if they are to qualify.

 

Date	Home Team	Result	Away Team
03/09/2010	Armenia	0-1 (0-0)	Republic Of Ireland
07/09/2010	Republic Of Ireland	3-1 (2-1)	Andorra
08/10/2010	Republic Of Ireland	2-3 (0-2)	Russia
12/10/2010	Slovakia	1-1 (1-1)	Republic Of Ireland
26/03/2011	Republic Of Ireland	2-1 (2-1)	FYROM
04/06/2011	FYROM	0-2 (0-2)	Republic Of Ireland
02/09/2011	Republic Of Ireland	0-0 (0-0)	Slovakia
06/09/2011	Russia	0-0 (0-0)	Republic Of Ireland
07/10/2011	Andorra	0-2 (0-2)	Republic Of Ireland
11/10/2011	Republic Of Ireland	2-1 (1-0)	Armenia
07/10/2011	Estonia	0-4 (0-1)	Republic Of Ireland
11/10/2011	Republic Of Ireland	1-1 (1-0)	Estonia

Republic Of Ireland did extremely well to qualify for Euro 2012. They were always going to find life tough behind Russia in the group but fought off challenges from Armenia and Slovakia to eventually take the runners up spot. Their playoff against Estonia was won in comfortable fashion and Republic Of Ireland now head to their first major championships in ten years.

Midfielders: Glenn Whelan, Liam Lawrence, Darron Gibson, Keith Fahey, Aiden McGeady, Keith Andrews, Stephen Hunt, Stephen Ward, Damien Duff.

Republic Of Ireland Player Stats From Euro 2012 Qualifying

Republic Of Ireland Player's Goal Stats

Here are the most important goal stats from Republic Of Ireland's Euro 2012 qualifying group. Use these to pick the best goalscorer bets on Republic Of Ireland's games at Euro 2012.

Player	Games (Sub)	Goals	Games Scored In	First Goals	Last Goals	Hat Tricks	Pens Scored
Robbie Keane	11	7	5	1	3	0	2
Kevin Doyle	9	2	1	1	0	0	0
Aiden McGeady	11 (1)	2	2	1	1	0	0

*All stats reflect bookies rules for own goals and 90 mins play in their respective markets. Eight other Republic Of Ireland players scored a single goal in qualification and there was also one own goal.

Republic Of Ireland's goalscorers should be good to bet on at Euro 2012, they have very few players who score regularly for them and their scoring charts are dominated by Robbie Keane, who was by far their top scorer in qualifying with seven goals, five more than the next best scorer. He is undoubtedly the best anytime scorer bet for Ireland having scored in five different matches, a record of almost one in two for a team that doesn't score that many goals.

Keane wasn't prolific in terms of first goals, just one of his seven goals was the first of the game so he would appear poor value in the first goalscorer betting, Kevin Doyle and Aiden McGeady equalled Robbie Keane's first goal tally despite scoring much fewer goals. Robbie Keane does look a decent bet to score the last goal in Republic Of Ireland matches though, he scored three last goals which isn't a bad return from eleven matches, it certainly would have made a nice profit backing him for the last goalscorer in every game.

Republic Of Ireland Players' Disciplinary Stats

Check Republic Of Ireland's yellow and red card stats below to help highlight the best bets in the cards markets for Republic Of Ireland's Euro 2012 matches.

Player	Games (Sub)	Yellow Cards	First Yellow Card Of Game	Red Cards
Kevin Doyle	9	3	0	1
Richard Dunne	10	4	0	0
Sean St Ledger	9	3	0	0
Stephen Ward	5	2	1	0
Stephen Kelly	4 (1)	1	1	0
Glenn Whelan	12	1	0	0
Darron Gibson	1 (3)	1	0	0
Kieren Westwood	1	1	1	0
Simon Cox	3 (4)	1	1	0
Stephen Hunt	2 (5)	1	0	0
Aiden McGeady	11 (1)	1	0	0

Republic Of Ireland picked up plenty of bookings in qualifying, in fact they got almost as many bookings (19) as they got goals. Seven players were booked just once during qualifying, three of which picked up the first booking in the match in which they were booked. 

Four players were booked more than once Stephen Ward was one of those repeat offenders, he was booked twice in the five games he played and one of those bookings was the first of the match. Kevin Doyle, Richard Dunne and Sean St Ledger were all booked more than twice, between them they managed to get booked ten times, that was more than half of the total bookings for the team.

Kevin Doyle not only picked up three yellow cards, he also picked up a red card. That red card was as a result of two of his yellow cards coming in the same match so he actually only got booked in two separate matches and is probably not the best bet to be Republic Of Ireland's most booked player at Euro 2012.

Sean St Ledger also got booked three times, all on separate occasions, and he is the sort of player who will pick up more bookings at the finals but the main man to concentrate on in the bookings markets is surely experienced defender Richard Dunne, who got booked four times in qualifying. No player going to Euro 2012 picked up more bookings than Richard Dunne in qualifying.

Republic Of Ireland Team Stats From Euro 2012 Qualifying

Republic Of Ireland's team stats can be found below, these stats can be applied to plenty of match markets during Euro 2012.

Ireland Goal Stats		Ireland Results Stats
Games	12	No. Of Games	12
Goals	20	No. Of Games Won	7
Conceded	8	No. Of Games Drawn	4
First Goals	9	No. Of Games Lost	1
Last Goals	6	No. Of Games Winning At Half Time	7
Over 1.5 / 2.5 / 3.5	9 / 5 / 3	No. Of Games Drawing At Half Time	4
Under 1.5 / 2.5 / 3.5	3 / 7 / 9	No. Of Games Losing At Half Time	1
Clean Sheets	6	No. Of Games Team Won Both Halves	2
First Half Clean Sheets	8	No. Of Games Won To Nil	4
Second Half Clean Sheets	9
First Half Goals	12
Second Half Goals	8
None Scored	2
Team Scored In Both Halves	3
Games Both Teams Scored	6

Ireland weren't prolific scorers in qualifying, especially when you consider that a quarter of their total goals came in the two legged playoff against Estonia, but they were able to qualify because of their strong defensive record which saw them concede just eight goals and keep six clean sheets. That means they had a better defensive record per game than Euro 2012 Odds favourites Spain and Germany.

Republic Of Ireland regularly scored the first goal in their games but only scored the last goal in half of their matches. This reflects the fact that they scored twelve in the first half of their games and just eight in the second half. Republic Of Ireland also failed to score in both halves of nine of their twelve games so an in running pointer for Euro 2012 might be Ireland not to score in the second half if they have already scored in the first half. Also if Republic Of Ireland are winning at half time they look unlikely to outscore their opposition in the second half, they won both halves of only two games in qualifying.

Republic Of Ireland had a pretty good record of winning at half time, they held the lead in seven matches at half time which would be good for a team that won their group, never mind finished runners up. If you fancy Republic Of Ireland for any matches at Euro 2012 they should probably be backed to be winning at half time and full time in the half time/full time betting at value odds.

Republic Of Ireland Recent European Championships Performances

Year	Team Performance
2008	Did Not Qualify
2004	Did Not Qualify
2000	Did Not Qualify
1996	Did Not Qualify