Soccer: Coleman saves the blushes with winner against Georgia

Donegal's Seamus Coleman scored the only goal of the game as a sluggish Republic of Ireland side beat Georgia 1-0 in their World Cup Group D qualifier match at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin.

With neither Wes Hoolahan nor John O'Shea starting pundit Eamon Dunphy was not happy before the kick-off and described the team selection as "shocking."

The Irish really struggled to impress in an uninspiring first half that ended scoreless.

Georgia actually hit the woodwork twice in ten seconds.

The second half began slowly and the 39,700 strong crowd must have been wondering just what was going on.

But, in the 57th minute, the boys in green went ahead with captain Coleman scoring.

The Everton player surged down the right flank and eventually prodded the ball home after some suspect defending.

It was Coleman's first international goal.

See the link here

But this was far from being the one-way traffic that some expected and the Republic of Ireland found it hard to create many openings.

On 80 minutes Robbie Brady was stretchered off after a collision.

Jeff Hendrick picked up a late yellow card that rules him out of Sunday's game with Moldova.

Derry's James McClean, who earlier had a goal disallowed as he was deemed to be off-side when meeting a 58th minute Coleman cross, headed against the crossbar as the game went into stoppage time.