Stephen Kenny bemoans Irish set-piece defending

Republic of Ireland manager Stephen Kenny was left to bemoan his side's set-piece defending as they fell to a 2-1 defeat to Norway at the Aviva Stadium.

Norwegian substitute Ohi Omoijuanfo snatched victory for the visitors with his first senior international goal after Alan Browne had cancelled out Leo Ostigard's opener.

It was a kick in the teeth for Stephen Kenny's men, who had rallied after a poor first-half performance to look the team more likely to win the game in the second-half.

Both of Norway’s goals came from set-pieces with Ostigard getting in front of John Egan at a corner for the opener before Omoijuanfo grabbed the win on the 85th minute when Nathan Collins failed to deal with a Martin Odegaard free-kick into the box.

"I think it was pretty even overall," Kenny told RTÉ Sport afterwards. "The way they play in Norway, they’re difficult to play through, they block up the middle of the pitch, have a very good pressing system and the space is on the outside.

"We didn’t maximise that in the first-half, we couldn’t get down the side of them the way we did in the second-half.

"We didn’t create chances in the first-half, that was disappointing. The second-half we created three or four really good chances before we scored."

"Alan Browne got a great goal and then we absolutely shot ourselves in the foot with the goal we conceded, so it’s a really poor goal to concede.

"To concede the goal we did, we absolutely undid all our good work. All the good work that we did to get back into the game, we undid in just a moment of not being able to defend that wide free-kick.

"That was a terrible goal for us to concede and we’re not happy about that."

Browne was named the player-of-the-match for his second-half performance with a fine