Please, try again later
After the Republic of Ireland’s tame win in Gibraltar, it’s hard to have any confidence in Mick McCarthy’s charges. Gibraltar are ranked in 194th place in FIFA international World football, playing 20 times and losing them all. To give a comparison, Georgia are ranked 91st and the Republic of Ireland 34th. Georgia have been winning most of their UEFA Nations League games, albeit against lower opposition than the Republic of Ireland. The Irish side’s form is very poor having won just the two games from twelve played since November 2017. Georgia have won eight of their last eleven games.
The Republic of Ireland had gone seven games without a win before beating Gibraltar away 1-0 on Saturday. That record isn't quite as bad as it seems because they had drawn four of those games. Earlier in the season, they finished bottom of their Nations League group and were relegated to League C. That bad performance won't help them if they need to rely on the play-offs to qualify for Euro 2020. Ireland had also failed to score in their four games played before the trip to Gibraltar but three of their last five matches have ended goalless. Home form has seen them win one of their last five games and fail to score in the last three. Each of their last six games have had under 2.5 goals scored in them.
Georgia didn't trouble the scorers in their opening Euro 2020 fixture as they lost 2-0 at home to Switzerland. That's compared to the 12 goals they scored as they won their Nations League group and won promotion to League C. They were only up against Latvia, Andorra and Kazakhstan and this is tougher Five of their last six away games have had under 2.5 goals scored in them. Their Euro qualifying record has never resulted in them reaching the final and only one of their last 15 away games have been won and that was against Gibraltar, Go for Ireland to win a low-scoring game.