Breaking Ireland into round 2 of the play-offs after win in Slovakia

The Republic of Ireland finished their group campaign with a 1-0 in Slovakia on Tuesday evening to ensure they will go straight into round 2 of the World Cup play-offs.

Denise O'Sullivan's well-taken goal in the first half settled a dour contest and ensured Ireland are one of the three best ranked sides of the nine who made the play-offs, thus bypassing round 1.

The draw will be made this Friday lunchtime, - so from Wednesday onwards, it's fair to assume this game will fade very quickly from the memory.

It was poor fare. Ireland, as happened in Dublin when the sides met last November, found the going tough against dogged opponents intent on disrupting their opponents' rhythm whenever possible.

They made a decent fist of it, but ultimately O'Sullivan's flash of quality broke their resistance and Ireland showed enough nous thereafter to see it home.

Not pretty, but job done and now Pauw's resilient charges can finally relax before discovering what exactly a massive October holds in store.

THERE IT IS! Denise O'Sullivan with the finish after a break by Jess Ziu left Heather Payne with the chance to cutback to the in-form midfielder#rtesoccer #SVKIRL