Brian Kerr experienced his first major disappointment as Irish youth team manager when his under-16s were emphatically knocked out of the UEFA championship in Herzlia, Israel, yesterday morning. It was a doubly inglorious defeat as it ended Ireland's reign as European Champions at this age group in their first match in defence of the title historically won in Scotland last May.
It was also Kerr's biggest competitive defeat in 60 games since he took charge just over two years ago and his first time to fail to qualify for a finals tournament.
But there were few complaints at the finish. Ireland did precious little with much possession in the first-half and Israel, looking a far better all-round team than the one that beat Turkey 2-1 on Tuesday, bided their time to score a good opening goal early in the second-half.
Ireland then handed the game to their hosts when gifting them a second soon after with a third coming late on.
Israel now go through to the UEFA finals in the Czech Republic in April while Ireland will hope to restore their pride when fulfilling their remaining fixture with Turkey tomorrow.
"We didn't play well at all," said an almost apologetic Kerr. "Our midfield didn't show any movement and looked cumbersome. We were outplayed in the second-half.
"At 1-0 we had a long time to get back into it, but the second goal from a bad mistake was a real killer.
"Basically, the loss of the four experienced players absent with injuries told. We simply weren't good enough without them.
"I was happy with the amount of possession we had in the first-half, but not with what we did with it. We just gave the ball away too easily."
Ireland, with Niall Hudson seeing a lot of the ball up the right flank, retained the ball for long spells in the first-half, forcing five corners to Israel's none. But there was little or no quality ball coming in from wide and precious little penetration up front.
Ireland were a trifle aggrieved that a goal by Robert Doyle was disallowed for a marginal offside on 18 minutes, but otherwise they could scarcely complain as, in all honesty, they never played with the guile and drive that has become customary from Kerr's teams.
There was some relief at the break after goalkeeper Barry Roche prevented Ireland from falling behind with an excellent diving save to parry away a drive from Kfir Tchokol on 39 minutes.
It then all went horribly wrong within four minutes of the restart when dangerman Eli Biton wasn't closed down and he showed pace and composure to run past several Irish defenders before planting a low drive beyond Roche and into the corner of the net from the edge of the area for a superb opening goal.
Twelve minutes later, half-time substitute Danny Murphy and Roche got their communication totally wrong to gift the ball to Israeli substitute Royi Hazan who gleefully tapped home from two yards.
Irish captain David van Zanten, who had moved into midfield from left-back, forced a tip-over save from Israeli goalkeeper Galil Ben-Shanan while a handball inside the area by Yosi Nagar went unseen by Georgian referee, Merab Melaguradze as Ireland's effort was spent.
The skilful Biton fittingly had the final say when gliding past a couple of Irish players to shoot home Israel's third goal in the 78th minute.
ISRAEL (3-5-2): Ben-Shanan; Okashi, Lovan, Nagar; Shavit, Hideman, Shivhon, Zur, Oved; Tchokol, Biton. Subs: Hazan for Shivhon (49 mins); Ben-Lulu for Shavit (54 mins); Haimovitch for Oved (69 mins).
REPUBLIC OF IRELAND (4-3-3): Roche (Nottingham Forest); Hudson (Nottingham Forest), Coleman (Wolverhampton Wanderers), Shevlin (Nottingham Forest), van Zanten (Tolka Rovers); Cawley (Leeds United), Lester (Everton), McDermott (Manchester United); Larkin (Wolverhampton Wanderers), Doyle (Blackburn Rovers), McNamara (Nottingham Forest). Subs: Murphy (QPR) for Lester (halftime), Gamble (Everton, Cork) and O'Flynn (Wimbledon) for McDermott and McNamara (both 61 mins).
Referee: M Melaguradze (Georgia).
