FROM CALAMITY TO CATASTROPHE

IRELAND fans will be stocking their fridges with pizzas and beer and making sure they have spare batteries for the remote as another summer of couch surfing awaits.

- BY PAUL O'HEHIR

The players won't be going to the World Cup either - not after being outplayed, outthought and outmuscled by the 105th-ranked team.

It was utterly hopeless stuff - a clueless, disjointed, lucky-dip attempt to win a game of football that never looked close to coming off.

It took the FAI 231-days to appoint Stephen Kenny's successor, a farcical search that ended with Heimir Hallgrimsson as the chosen one.

But two games into the six-game campaign, it's hard to see any way back for him beyond this year - unless he beats Portugal and Hungary.

Hallgrimsson, contracted to the end of this World Cup campaign, certainly talked a good game in the build up.