Martin O’Neill and Robbie Keane were among the first to praise Aiden McGeady for his wonder goal against Georgia.
Two minutes from the final whistle the Everton man received the ball at the edge of the penalty box surrounded by Georgia players.
Checking to his right then performing a Cruyff turn McGeady created a yard of space then curled an unstoppable shot into the roof of the net to give Ireland a winning start to their Group D qualifying campaign.
“Aiden McGeady is one of the most talented players in our team,” O’Neill admitted. “He scored twice tonight and deserves to be praised. We controlled the ball over the whole game.
“We could [have lost] after they scored an equaliser, but we avoided that. Our team has developed during last two months and our performance has been getting better.
“To be honest, we didn’t do too much to score our second goal. Georgia didn’t show all their qualities – they can play better. I was a bit surprised because it looked like Georgia would be satisfied with a draw. Probably they are not at their highest level right now. I know they can play better.
Former Celtic team-mate Keane added: “If you score a goal like that, you deserve to win the game. If anyone else did that, the top players in the world, you would be talking about it for a long time.
“The turn, the touch, the finish- only he could do that. No-one else on that field would have been able to do that.”
McGeady opened the scoring in the 24th minute and was delighted to make a scoring contribution on the road to France.
“The first goal came from a bit of luck, Jon Walters knocked the ball on, Robbie Keane dummied it and James McCarthy showed a good bit of composure,” he said looking at the build up to the first goal. “He could have taken a shot himself but he slid it in for me.
“Of course, I would like to score more. In the qualifying campaign for the last EUROs, I feel I played well but still not what I am capable of. This is a good start for me and the team – hopefully we can build on it.
“I know I need to score more for Ireland. At club level it’s not too bad, but I should score more for my country.”
Ireland’s next match is at home to Gibraltar who lost 7-0 at home to Poland last night with the game staged in Faro.
