No McAteer as expected due to a knee injury, and his sad face on the bench told it all. Steve Staunton captained the team today winning his 100th Cap for his country. Nothing short of pure genius in both commitment and hard work was the real synopsis behind today’s result. We got the point which will do just fine, and today’s adventure will surely go down in history right beside that glorious win over Italy in the Giants Stadium, in the 1994 World cup finals. A final burst from the one and only Robbie Keane – with the assistance of the mighty Quinn, saw the Irish equalise sending sheer pleasure through any Irish blooded individual throught the globe.

The Duffer got us off to an early fighting start, and he had the Germans unnerved throughout the game. After about 7 minutes our man Shay got on the end of a cross from Germanys “Frings”, and was ideally placed to save it. On the 19th minute "Ballack" found the new German sensation, “Klose”, who brought his 2002 World cup total to four goals. Ireland 0 - 1 Germany.

Mattie Holland almost mirrored the goal against Cameroon on the 23rd minute, but somehow sent it wide. Duffer again stretched the Germans to allow Finnan time on the ball on the right; he passed Kelly and chip over the top from the edge of the box found Keane who got an overhead kick totally wrong. Duff himself almost equalised in the 58th minute. Kilbane flicked a cross from Harte from the left into the box and Duff, taking a dropping ball over his left shoulder volleyed but Kahn stretched an arm and palmed the ball away.

Mick McCarthy then substituted Niall Quinn for Gary Kelly and Steven Reid for Ian Harte. After nothing short of immense pressure from the Irish with practically nothing left on the clock, Keane, with the help of Quinn, burst through three tackles and whipped a shot in to the roof the net for the magnificent equaliser. Mick had a memorable smile on his face, and full of emotion as his team fought back from a goal down to snatch a draw against Germany in the dying moments of a poor game was unequivocal in his praise of the "World's Greatest Supporters" in the Hashima Stadium Ibaraki, Japan. We will always go down fighting. A well-deserved result, and we certainly deserved something out of this game. At half time, Mick said to the boys – "Don't come off beating them at football and lose, come off with a result,and they HAVE done it. We had to take a chance, what's the point of coming here and going out without a fight, it's never going to happen. They did brilliant; it's a great result. I'm delighted for Quinn getting involved and of course Robbie gets his goal. We've given ourselves a chance, haven't we? We've still got to play Saudi and I'll be watching them play Cameroon tomorrow. We'll see what happens, we're in with a shout".………………Roll on the Saudis......YOULL NEVER BEAT THE IRISH.

Teams on the day

Republic of Ireland- Given, Finnan, Breen, Staunton (Cunningham 87), Harte (Reid 77), Kelly (Quinn 77), Kinsella, Holland, Kilbane, Keane, Duff

Subs not used: Kiely, A Kelly, Connolly, Dunne, Morrison, O'Brien, Carsley

Germany- Kahn, Linke, Metzelder, Ziege, Frings, Hamann, Ramelow, Ballack, Ziege, Klose (Bode 85) Jancker (Bierhoff 77) - Subs: Rehmer, Baumann, Neuville, Ricken, Lehmann, Asamoah, Kehl, Jeremies, Boehme, Butt