Ireland beats Italy 1-0 to advance to round of 16

“Now, we have a match against one of the favorites to win the competition as a whole”, Conte said, before highlighting how Italy had been written off before the tournament by its own media and expected to bow out at the group stage.

Even when another early exit from a European Championship seemed unavoidable, Ireland refused to concede.

Ireland’s reward is a match against France in Lyon on Sunday that will surely resonate for Ireland’s passionate fans as it will revive memories of the last time the two sides met in November 2009, in a two-legged playoff for the following year’s World Cup.

“We know they’re a top-class team and they have got some unbelievable players, but if we can stick together and click like we clicked tonight, we can hurt anybody, so I don’t think we have anything to fear”.

He said with a smile: “It is definite we are playing France, isn’t it?”

O’Neill said: “It was a great win”.

“We can apply the philosophy of Atletico, take it game by game”. “We have won the game, we deserved to win it and we dominated for incredible periods of the game and played some phenomenal stuff”.

Needing a win to qualify from Group E, Ireland looked to be running out of ideas against group winners Italy, but Brady popped up with five minutes to go, heading home a Wes Hoolahan cross.

“I just kept my concentration and thought another chance might come or I might be able to create something. The pitch did punish us a bit more than them”. Needless to say, he instantly became the most popular person in Ireland.

“In the majority of the three games, we have been the better team”, he added.