Caitlin Hayes confident Ireland will thrive in elite company

Caitlin Hayes believes the Republic of Ireland will prove they belong among the best teams in Europe after they sealed promotion to League A of the UEFA Nations League.

The Girls in Green slogged through awful conditions in Albania on Tuesday to snatch a 1-0 win thanks to Denise O'Sullivan's 88th-minute effort.

Those three points left them with an unassailable lead in Group 1 of League B with two matches to spare.

Ireland have now been elevated to the top tier as one of the continent's 16 best-ranked sides, while their seeding for the Euro 2025 qualifiers - which begins in April - is also boosted.

These are heady times for an ambitious squad, with Celtic defender Hayes confident they're capable of raising the bar even higher.

"It’s where this team deserves to be," she said. "We deserve to be in that [League] A, we’ve worked hard for it and I can’t think of a better place for Ireland to be than in [League] A and to compete with the best.

"We are the best and we’ll prove that on the stages we’re lucky enough to play on when those [group] draws happen."

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Hayes declared for Ireland in September and went straight into the starting XI for the clash with Northern Ireland at the Aviva Stadium.

The 28-year-old - eligible to represent the country through her Offaly-born grandfather - has been an excellent addition to interim boss Eileen Gleeson's panel; an elegant, tough centre-half who has filled the void left by the injured Aoife Mannion.

"I was declaring for a long time that I was Irish and I