First senior starts for Donegal’s Toland and Barrett

Donegal girls were to the fore as the Republic of Ireland delivered the perfect away performance in Slovakia on Wednesday to make it two wins from two games in their FIFA 2019 World Cup qualifying campaign.
16 year old Tyler Toland from St Johnston and Milford’s Amber Barrett made their first senior starts for the Women’s National Team as manager Colin Bell celebrated six points from six.
First-half goals from Denise O’Sullivan and skipper Katie McCabe sealed an impressive 2-0 victory with Barrett involved in the second goal.
It’s maximum points for Ireland ahead of next month’s trip to the Netherlands to face the European Champions.
WNT Head Coach Colin Bell said: “I’m very proud of the performance. The two moments of quality got us the goals but it was our hard work throughout the 95 minutes which got us the points tonight.
“It was always going to be a physical test for us but I thought we stood upto it brilliantly. You look across the entire game and they haven’t had a single goal-scoring opportunity and those defensive foundations are virtually important.
“It’s a great start to the campaign with the two wins over Slovakia and Northern Ireland so now we look to the Netherlands game next month and take that confidence into that game. It will be another tough game but we’ll look at it and try and come up with another winning strategy.”