Defender Stephen Ward believes the Republic of Ireland are showing signs of improvement as they continued their Euro 2016 preparations with a 2-2 draw against Slovakia.
Martin O’Neill’s side followed up last Friday’s victory over Switzerland with an entertaining share of the spoils with Slovakia at the Aviva Stadium.
“We kept quite well which maybe we haven’t done in recent games"
Ireland recovered from an early goal down to score two penalties in two minutes from Shane Long and James McClean, with an own goal from Paul McShane on the stroke of half-time the fourth and final goal of the game.
With 10 changes to the side that defeated Switzerland, it was an opportunity for players to impress and Ward believes a change in formation as well as personnel bore fruit, with Ireland keeping hold of possession for large parts of the lively encounter.
“The manager changed the formation and I think that helped us,” he told RTÉ Sport.
“I thought we controlled most of the game and we can be reasonably happy with the performance. On the ball tonight we were good.
“We kept quite well which maybe we haven’t done in recent games.
“It’s a game we could have won but we’ll take a draw.”
Ireland will play the Netherlands and Belarus in their final warm-up friendlies before the European Championships.
