Republic of Ireland veteran goalkeeper Shay Given has praised his national team's efforts after their late comeback against Poland to earn a vital point in their Euro2016 qualifier on Sunday.
Striker Shane Long scored an injury-time goal to level the score at 1-1 in Dublin against group leaders Poland to sit fourth in Group D.
"Yeah, it's a big point," Aston Villa keeper Given said. "We're disappointed, of course, with the first half performance. But we were a totally different team in the second, I felt.
"It's probably the nature of the point, that it came so late with the goal, but it would have been really interesting if we'd got it five minutes earlier; we might have for a second had it not come a little bit too late but we created a lot of chances, hit the post and the crossbar a couple of times and on another night we could have snatched the win.
"The longer it goes on without the goal, the more you do think that it's not going to come but we've a great group of players with a never-say-die attitude; we've scored a few late goals in this qualifying campaign and that shows the character in the squad and in the team and we deserve credit for always going to the death.
"With how late the goal has come, you'd probably take that as a point gained. We'll have belief too going to Poland, especially after that second-half performance."
