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Republic of Ireland line up friendly with Slovakia

The draw for the football tournament was made in Paris on Saturday. He went through a phase in the Champions League when he conceded for 34 games straight, so that is a weakness.

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Although Spain is the only team to have won the competition consecutively, and won nine out of 10 games in qualifying, coach Vicente del Bosque remains cautious. I think we will be equally well prepared for each of the team we play.

The Republic of Ireland will take on Slovakia in an global friendly at the Aviva Stadium on Tuesday 29 March as they continue their preparations for Euro 2016.

Wales’ opener will be in Bordeaux against Slovakia on June 11, and they meet Russian Federation in Toulouse on June 20.

World Cup victor Germany will also be content with the draw, although Italy wasn’t so lucky and neither was England. England are a very good team – but so are we.

The Republic of Ireland’s task looks to be the most hard in terms of the path to the knock-out rounds – with O’Neill questioning the seeding system that saw Italy excluded from the top seeds. ‘There will be plenty of research between now and June and we can find out as much as we can before the campaign.’ Coleman said: ‘It’s going to a great game between two good teams. They will face Poland in their opening game in Nice on June 12 before facing Ukraine in Lyon on June 16 and then the Germans at the Parc des Princes in Paris five days later.

“We have actually beaten the world champions so we’ll get some confidence from that”, added O’Neill, whose side finished third in qualifying Group D but made it to France thanks to a two-legged play-off success against Bosnia-Herzegovina in November. “We looked at it and would have wanted to avoid it, but we look forward to it”.

“I’m pleased it is Wales from a personal point of view as I’ve had 100 games now between Switzerland, England and Finland and never played against Wales and it will be a new acquaintance for me”.

“As far as we’re concerned, me and Chris, we’re really happy to be playing against each other”.

Hodgson has been buoyed by top-level backing from Football Association chief executive Martin Glenn that he is the man the governing body want to take England to the 2018 World Cup in Russian Federation, if his team can demonstrate progress at next summer’s European Championships. “There are some tasty teams there but we can absolutely get out of the group”.

“But at least we know all about their players, as basically they play in England”. It does not matter who you play. There are lots of plots and sub-plots, I don’t think the fans’ enthusiasm will be diminished by the draw, in fact I think they might even be enhanced.

“The great thing is we have no star players”.

“We’ve been friends for a long time”.

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Former Greek soccer player Angelos Charisteas displays the name “Northern Ireland”.

England manager Roy Hodgson and Wales boss Chris Coleman