Jeff Hendrick – fresh from making his move to Burnley to Derby County – opened the scoring after just three minutes, but Ireland sat back after that and were nearly made to pay in the second half.
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Burnley’s record signing had hit much better strikes for Ireland – several of them in the Euro 2016 games against Sweden and Italy – but a well-directed jab was enough to see the ball dribble past Predrag Rajkovic in the Serbian goal.
“We’re not going to come here to a team of the Czech Republic’s calibre and dominate possession of the ball”.
Courage and effort will only take you so far and Ireland are in danger of missing out on Russian Federation 2018 unless they learn how to keep a hold of the ball.
“It was a odd game, they got opportunities where nine times out of 10 they would have been expected to score – luck was on our side in these cases”.
Long missed the one big chance that came his way in Belgrade, but he needs more opportunities to make his mark and needs support from his manager and his team-mates to rise to the challenge of becoming Ireland’s next great goal scorer.
But Serbia were always unsafe on the counter and keeper Darren Randolph kept them at bay until the 62nd minute, when Filip Kostic was left unmarked at the far post to tap in Dusan Tadic’s cross.
It was header from substitute Daryl Murphy ten minutes from time that saw the side snatch a point, and O’Neill thought his side deserved to take something from the trip. Jeff Hendrick celebrated his first goal in 27 global appearances to give the Republic an early lead in Belgrade but the Serbs pinned their visitors back for long stretches of the game.
“We made changes in the side during the game, of course”. “We can’t continue to play without minutes in our legs at club level”.
“I don’t know what else you’re expecting”.
He also scored the first-minute penalty to give O’Neill’s side the lead in the second round defeat to France, and an impressive free kick in last week’s 4-0 win at home to Oman.
“I think the three points would have been there for the taking”, he said.
“We made some substitutions and thankfully, it paid dividends”.
Long had a goal controversially chalked off for offside but Ireland gained their reward through Murphy.
He said: “It’s very, very important for him”. He’s come in and he’s been a very strong header and it’s a great equalising goal for us, so he will take great confidence from that. I’m delighted with the point.
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“We created a number of chances in the game – and, in fairness, so did Serbia – so we’ve really got to sort of tighten up all around the place”.
