Dunne issues Republic warning

Richard Dunne
12 April 2012

Richard Dunne has warned his Republic of Ireland team-mates that the hard work will begin only after they have qualified for Euro 2012.

Ireland will book their place at next summer's finals provided they do not lose Tuesday night's play-off second leg clash with Estonia even more heavily than the crushing 4-0 defeat they inflicted on Tarmo Ruutli's men in Tallinn on Friday.

Dunne said: "We have not qualified yet - hopefully tomorrow night we will have, and then the hard work starts. There's no point in us going there thinking we have done our job and we have done ourselves proud. We have to go there and compete and hopefully pick up results when we get over there."

He added: "We have to believe that. There's no point saying, 'We have qualified and that's it, we are all delighted to qualify'. We have to now move on to the next step and our aim is then to qualify from the group, hopefully."

Two years ago, Ireland's play-off adventure infamously ended in heartache and acrimony in France with Thierry Henry cast in the role of pantomime villain.

However, despite his desolation, Dunne insists he was always confident that his chances of appearing in a finals tournament had not gone for good.

He said: "I think the performances in France and in that group confirmed to everyone that we were building a decent side and that the opportunities would come. Thankfully it has worked out just a couple of years down the line.

"It's obviously a different competition, a different time. It's all about tomorrow and the past is forgotten about.

"Over the last two campaigns especially, we have been building and building.

"The aim was probably to try to win the group this time around - we haven't done that, but things have worked out really well and we go into tomorrow's game with a really great chance of qualifying."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT