It was a goal fest tonight in Tolka Park with the Republic of Ireland Under 19's beating Poland 4-2 in an exciting end to end battle.

It was a slow start to the game, with both sides moving the ball well in the middle of the park. The only two chances of the first twenty minutes fell to Ronan Murray whose tame shots were saved by Filip Kurto.

Kurto had to come to the rescue again in the 32nd minute when his courageous double save prevented Conor Henderson and Ronan Murray getting the opening goal. Almost immediately after, a Polish attack at the other end forced Irish goal keeper, Ian McLoughlin, to make a superb save from Michal Zyro's shot.

The first goal of the game came in the 42nd minute when pressure from Conor Hourihane forced Piotr Kasak to loop the ball past his goalkeeper and into the back of his own net.

Ireland started the second half well and, in the 64th minute, Aaron Doran tapped in a well deserved goal after a good cross was delivered into the box from the left by Ronan Murray. Just three minutes later, Murray made it 3-1 when he got on the end of a fine pass from Ryan Brennan who had made a blistering run down the left flank.

Krzysztof Kasak opened Poland's scoring in the 71st minute when McLoughlin couldn't fully gather a cross right into his path.

With 80 minutes on the clock, Ryan Brennan initiated another Irish goal when he dispossessed Piotr Malarczyk to give an inch perfect pass to substitute Jamil Adam who steadied himself before slotting home from ten yards.

The game had one more twist when Marcin Kaminski took his chance well to score a stoppage-time goal for Poland after Ian McLoughlin had done well to brilliantly push away a header from Bartosz Salamon.

Ireland should take confidence from their performance, where their attack scored four well-taken goals. Defender Shaun Timmins spoke in posititve tones at the final whistle, telling fai.ie: "Our main focus tonight was to start well and put Poland under pressure early and we managed to do that in both halves.
"We got a bit sloppy in the last ten minutes which we paid for when they came back at us scoring twice. We will want to improve on that for the next game on Thursday."

Timmins commended the Polish, stating that they moved the ball well and were especially dangerous on the break.
The Republic of Ireland will host Poland in another friendly on Thursday night in Tolka Park at 7:30pm.