Republic of Ireland captain Nathan Collins is still unable to provide an explanation for his side’s 2-1 loss to Armenia last month ahead of welcoming the same opposition to Dublin on Tuesday.

Irish World Cup qualifying hopes were dealt a seismic blow with the defeat in Yerevan last month against the group’s lowest ranked side.

The performance grew even more perplexing considering their brave showing at the group’s top seeds Portugal on Saturday night, albeit losing 1-0, to a 91st minute Ruben Neves header.

The Brentford captain struggled to put his finger on what exactly went wrong in the embarrassing reverse against the Armenians when asked before Tuesday night’s game.

“It’s such an awkward one, football is such a mad sport, anything can happen, things change and it happens so quickly, momentum and how players feel,” Collins said.

“We just never got going, I think they [Armenia] grew in confidence from us struggling to get going, to create stuff. The togetherness we’ve seen in Portugal and the way we connected as an 11, was completely different to how we connected together in Armenia.

“I think Armenia took confidence from that, they took that confidence away from us. They probably had better chances, better spells, and they looked a better team.

“We have belief that we are a better team than that. We have belief that we can go and beat big teams and go against these teams and we can get results and put in good performances like Portugal. Sometimes there’s no clear explanation why, but it’s tough to take.”