{"id":1160115,"date":"2026-02-17T12:38:47","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T17:38:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/?p=1160115"},"modified":"2026-02-17T12:38:47","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T17:38:47","slug":"republic-of-ireland-trio-return-for-qualifiers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/republic-of-ireland-trio-return-for-qualifiers\/","title":{"rendered":"Republic of Ireland trio return for qualifiers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Courtney Brosnan, Megan Connolly and Leanne Kiernan have returned to the Republic of Ireland squad for next month&#8217;s 2027 Women&#8217;s World Cup qualifiers against France and the Netherlands. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Everton goalkeeper Brosnan, Lazio midfielder Connolly and forward Kiernan &#8211; on loan at Nottingham Forest from Liverpool &#8211; all missed the dramatic Nations League play-off win over Belgium in October because of injury.<\/p>\n<p>The 23-player squad is again captained by Arsenal&#8217;s Katie McCabe, who won her 100th cap in the play-off against Belgium. <\/p>\n<p>The Republic of Ireland face France at Tallaght Stadium in Dublin on 3 March before travelling to Utrecht to play the Netherlands four days later.<\/p>\n<p>Ward is hoping to emulate her predecessor Vera Pauw by leading the Republic of Ireland to next year&#8217;s finals in Brazil. <\/p>\n<p>Under Pauw, the Irish qualified for the tournament for the first time, but they exited after finishing bottom of their group. <\/p>\n<p>After beating Belgium 5-4 on aggregate to gain promotion to the top tier of the Nations League, the Republic of Ireland beat Hungary 3-2 in a behind-closed-doors friendly in Marbella. <\/p>\n<p>West Ham&#8217;s Jess Ziu and Leicester City&#8217;s Heather Payne are among the players not included. <\/p>\n<h2>Republic of Ireland squad<\/h2>\n<p><strong>Goalkeepers:<\/strong> Courtney Brosnan (Everton), Sophie Whitehouse (Charlton Athletic), Grace Moloney (Sunderland)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Defenders:<\/strong> Katie McCabe (Arsenal), Anna Patten (Aston Villa), Caitlin Hayes (Brighton &amp; Hove Albion), Hayley Nolan (Crystal Palace), Aoife Mannion (Newcastle United), Jessie Stapleton (Nottingham Forest &#8211; loan), Chloe Mustaki (Nottingham Forest)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Midfielders: <\/strong>Denise O&#8217;Sullivan (Liverpool), Tyler Toland (Durham), Megan Connolly (Lazio), Marissa Sheva (Sunderland), Lucy Quinn (Birmingham City), Ruesha Littlejohn (Crystal Palace), Jamie Finn (Sunderland)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Attackers: <\/strong>Saoirse Noonan (Celtic), Abbie Larkin (Crystal Palace), Leanne Kiernan (Nottingham Forest &#8211; loan), Emily Murphy (Newcastle United), Kyra Carusa (Kansas City Current &#8211; loan), Amber Barrett (Strasbourg)<\/p>\n<p>\u200b<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/articles\/republic-ireland-trio-return-qualifiers-123847286.html\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"\">https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/articles\/republic-ireland-trio-return-qualifiers-123847286.html<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtney Brosnan, Megan Connolly and Leanne Kiernan have returned to the Republic of Ireland squad for next month&#8217;s 2027 Women&#8217;s World Cup qualifiers against France&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1160116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1160115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1160115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1160115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1160115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1160116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1160115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1160115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1160115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}