HAVING HAD LITTLE time to prepare before taking on Latvia and Poland in his new job as Ireland manager, Martin O’Neill now has three months before he selects a squad for the first time for the friendly against Serbia in March.
He will have evaluated the group of players who trained in Dublin this month and must consider whether there are others available to him who would strengthen the current crop. Either way, there is likely to be plenty of scouting by O’Neill and his assistant Roy Keane.
Brian Kerr was in a similar position when he was appointed international boss in 2003 and this week spoke to TheScore.ie about how O’Neill will be using the time.
So, what does Martin O’Neill do between now and March? Is it all about scouting his players?
He may want to rearrange some of the backroom staff after having a look at how things worked in the last two games. Saying that, he may look at them and see they’re fine so think ‘we’ll work away as it is’.
Usually when managers come in they want to tweak things. In general, they will demand some improvements and want to extract more investment from the association in the early stages. That’s usually how it works.
He may want to bring in another staff member or two. I’m not quite sure why they would need more staff around the team as there are two people there who are quite capable of doing a bit of coaching. The idea of having a set-piece specialist would rather surprise me.
Every manager has his own ideas about it but to bring someone in just specifically for that role seems a rather strange one. But we’ll see what happens.
Scouting will be very much a part of it as there are loads of players to evaluate. He said he didn’t know much about Paul Green until he got in to working close to the team for instance so he will want to get around and see all the players.
What else does he need to look at?
The other one is the question are there other players out there who are eligible who he would want to assess, evaluate and compare to what he has before he picks his next squad in March next year.
That’s the sort of work he will be doing. Whether they’re are others that are eligible, you would hope that whoever they are, they have got to be better than what we have already. Otherwise what’s the point in going to the bother of getting them.
He’s an experienced manager and will know what he has to do with regard to that. He will be familiar with the rules and how to exploit them as many countries are using them to the maximum to improve the options they have.
You can’t blame any manager, or an Irish one in particular as we’re working off such a low population base where you’re less likely to produce geniuses.
What are your thoughts on current rules which allow players to switch allegiance having played a senior friendly for one country like in Diego Costa’s case?
FIFA really need to tighten up the rules. It has become too loose and almost farcical where fellas are playing for different countries. Whatever about playing up until U19, by the time you’re that age you know what country you’re from.
Playing at senior international level and changing and the situation where players can get passports after living there five years which makes them eligible is far too loose.
But that’s how it is and if you’re competing with everyone else I think we’re entitled to exploit our diaspora whatever the best way possible.
We’ve got a history of emigration and also have a low playing base as well as the unique situation of having so many ball games in this country.
Expect to see O’Neill at plenty of Premier League grounds. Credit: INPHO/Billy Stickland
When you’re looking into possible ‘granny rule’ players, should they feel Irish already or are you happy to try convince them to declare for the country?
As a manager approaching that sort of stuff, my first attitude would be that they need to be better than what we have available if they need convincing to play for us. For many player who are the children of Irish people in England, there isn’t persuasion involved in it as they want to play for Ireland.
Unfortunately they can be in an environment at a club where there would be people who would be persuading them to hang on and play for England, which was the case when I was manager.
That is a problem they have to deal with. It’s not always easy for young players to understand how it’s going to be if they haven’t been regular visitors to Ireland. Will they be accepted into the group if they have English accents and don’t know Amhran na bhFiann? How will it be for them?
You would understand that there might be a reluctance until they meet some of the people or get to know some of the players. I think we were always very careful going back with Noel O’Reilly and all my other staff.
How did you man-manage bringing new players into the squad?
We had to make sure that players coming in like Aiden McGeady for instance, who was under pressure to play for Scotland, felt very comfortable in the group.
It was a delicate one right up until 18 or 19 when I selected him for the senior team. I remember calling his father about it and I explained to him that I was going to play him for a few minutes during a match in London.
I told him he wasn’t going to get a lot of time on the pitch as he was still quite physically lightweight but that eventually it would happen for him.
I thought it was important for him to get some of the pressure that was there off him because Scotland were trying to persuade him. He was invited to meet Berti Vogts and to see the stadium.
I’d say he’s very happy with that decision (looking back). When he came to Ireland he was always comfortable and he used to ask me if he could go see his aunt in Meath. So in the end it worked out.
Former Republic of Ireland manager Brian Kerr yesterday helped to launch the Soccer Writers’ Association of Ireland’s (SWAI) Brendan McKenna Memorial Award for 2013. For more information, visit www.swai.ie
This entire article probably highlights many of the reasons why Irish football is in the doldrums. The focus of the interview is entirely about how Ireland could strengthen its squad by sourcing ready made players. The underlying assumption is that this is the only way to source players. The changes that have been wrought in the academy system of the major English clubs over the past 20 years has meant that fewer young Irish teenagers than ever before go to England for their football education. A glance at recent Irish squads shows that a growing number play for Irish clubs before transferring to the UK in the late teens and early twenties. Indeed many players who go to England as youths return to play in the League of Ireland before earning their move back across the water again.
The gulfs that exist in the game in Ireland badly need to be addressed if the senior international side is to have any kind of strength in the future. The current League of Ireland Under 19 system is a good start but it is inadequate. For instance in Ireland any young sportsman is inevitably pulled in several sporting directions in his teens. Looking towards the GAA he sees a clear path from his local club at Under age into their minor team then into the county minors, the club Under 21′s or Juniors, the county Under 21′s, the club’s senior side and finally the holy grail of the county senior team. The path is clear and unambiguous. In football he will hope to get into the FAI’s emerging talent program at age 11, if he is outside of that his next big hope is to called up to his local Legaue’s representative Under 13 Kennedy Cup side where he night get spotted by an English club. Failing those options he continue in the hope that he finds a spot in League of Ireland U19 side. If he has made it that far once he hits 19 he has to find his way straight into a League of Ireland first team squad, competing with players who have a few years experience to do so. If he is doesn’t get that far then he is out of senior football. Many of those players who are good footballers drift out of the game at that point, unwilling to take the plunge back down into the depths of Junior/Sunday league football. For some there is an option to join a LoI First Division side but it is not an attractive one. This is an eight team league with sides spread all over the country. The prospect of a fortnightly trip to or from Ballybofey to Athlone or Waterford is not exactly appealing. So players go and standards drop.
So what if League of Ireland standards drop? The strength of what is above is often governed by what is beneath it. I have watched Ireland Under 21 sides populated by players from English Conferences teams while players from League of Ireland sides pay at the gate to watch them. I have seen very good league of Ireland players never get a whiff of an Irish representative side until they go to England ( ref. Seamus Coleman). We need to see a complete overall of the structure of football in Ireland – a proper pyramid system with smaller regionalised leagues, a removal of the power of local league administrators to hinder such developments, fully developed career paths for better players to progress through etc etc.
What we will get is, a new FAI genealogy section, trawling through the ancestry of players in the English leagues to see who we can poach. We will see huge spending on the maintenance of an average senior international side. Big salaries to the CEO, senior international mangers, bonuses promised to players for WC qualification. Lip service paid to the development of players locally. Well meaning but often inadequately structured coaching at under age levels.
Of course we might manage to unearth a surprised newly awakened Irishman like Tony Cascarino or Andy Townsend……….. and that will prove that the system works and make everything alright again
He has to least win the European championships, it’s not too much to ask
No offence to the journalist,but why have you got an ex manager of Ireland,who btw was sacked for a very good reason he was crap,giving advice to a manager with O’Neills exp ? Why not just get Noel King or The Gaffer on and totally botch it ? In all fairness if you had Jack Charlton or even John Giles giving it I’d kinda be ok with it. Martin O’Neill is his own man,let him be to do it himself,he doesn’t need the ex manager of the Faroe Islands telling him how to do his job.
Good point, like getting dental advice from Shane McGowan
Kerr was a fantastic manager and was seriously mistreated by the fai. The best we ever had in terms of a record and he came in at the worst possible time.
Brian Kerr has the highest win rate of any Ireland manager at 54.5%. Charlton had 50.5% (which is arguably better because we played more top teams due to qualifying for tournaments). McCarthy had a 42.5% win rate and Giles was around 38%. I’d be reluctant to knock any of the above.
He should drive his car with the song playing “I AM THE ONE AND ONLY”
People who comment on sport do it because it allows them to pontificate an extraordinary ignorance for which they would lose their day jobs in a flash. Brian Kerr was a great manager we can only hope mon does at least as well.
Sigh…you are a former manager for a reason brian!
We are a small, limited country..only so many irish grannies out there.
You’d think that, but Stephen Ireland proved there’s loads more then we thought
Oh my god!
Those who can; Do
Those who can’t, waffle on about what those who can should do
Agree with John Clarke, whole structure has to be changed, though Seamus Coleman is a poor example, he was on the u21 side for 2 years while at sligo rovers, better example would be matt doherty. THink the 8 team first division is pointless, might aswell have 20 team league and it might encourage players to play senior football here
Selecting English players who aren’t good enough to play for England is not the way forward. England are barely even that strong in depth to begin with. If an English player has no chance of playing for them, then he is hardly going to make much of a tangible difference to us, is he?
Steven Gerrard, Paul Scholes, Aaron Lennon, Gary Cahill, Rio Ferdinand, Wayne Rooney, even Kyle Naughton; all of those guys could/would potentially improve us but Sean St Ledger, Paul Green and Jon Walters are scarcely better than the Irish born players whose places they take in the team.
Even use Anthony Pilkington as an example. He is hardly any better than McClean, Brady or McGeady.
We should stop depending on Granny rule players and start improving our domestic infrastructure and make soccer a more attractive proposition than Gaelic and rugby to our kids. You can’t make money from Gaelic so the former theoretically shouldn’t be that hard.
Who are these wonderful, match changing Granny rule players Martin O’Neill is scouring by the way? Focus on nailing down Jack Grealish, Conor Henderson and Samir Carruthers and hope that they fulfill the hype because for all of the excitement over them, they could easily end up like Conor Clifford or Stephen Elliott.
Totally agree, pulled this article form the Irish times, in 2010-2011 Irish people spent 145 MILLION going to see British teams & thats excluding merchandise & skysports subscription, imagine if a fraction of that was spent on Irish soccer! We could have Irish clubs competing in the europa & chapions league!
”In the 2010-2011 season there were 164,000 visits by Irish fans to British grounds.
The average spend for foreign fans was €776 (€884.64). Multiplying 164,000 by €884.65 gives a figure of €145 million. I ran the numbers many times. Surely, Irish fans couldn’t spend that amount of money in a year? Surely the decimal point was in the wrong place?
It must be €14.5 million, but the decimal point was in the right place. ”
http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/english-soccer/somebody-has-to-shout-stop-as-english-premier-league-stranglehold-in-ireland-strengthens-1.1496636
Conor will be back I hope! He’s some shot on him.
whiner
Good luck to Martin and the Irish team but I was appalled to see him and Roy Keane in a recent BBC interview when they took up their posts wearing the poppy. What is it with Irish people? They are Irish, appointed managers of the Ireland team. It was the BBC who requested the interview but they are allowed to insist that the boys wear poppies.
Fair play to the young Derry premiership player who refused to wear a poppy recently and who was dropped from the team How could he ever hold his head up in his native town if he had paid homage to those in the Army that killed so many Irish people there while Irish nationalists are not allowed to remember their dead. Shame on Martin and Roy.
We lose face a little whenever we recruit players with tenuous connections, and were widely sneered at during the glory years for doing so. There will have been some (Aiden McGeady, James McCarthy, or going back much further the likes of Seamus McDonagh and Tony Grealish) for whom the sense of Irishness is very genuinely heartfelt, but the logical terminus of exploiting FIFA’s rules to the full could be a team consisting entirely of English-born players with English accents whose presence in the team owes more to career advancement than national allegiance.
Personally, I think a parent is fine, but once you get into grandparent territory it becomes a bit ridiculous. I’m Dublin-born and could have played for Scotland in the unlikely event of me being remotely good enough to make the team, and would have represented either nation with pride. But a line needs to be drawn somewhere.
You could say that borders and nations are arbitrary constructs in the first place, but if international football is to remain meaningful it should be contested by teams whose players, by and large, were born and reared in the nation they represent.
On a related note, Kerr makes many valid points but I was deeply disappointed with his recent comments to the effect that we should leave Northern-born, Irish-identified players to the North and stop pursuing them. The McCleans and Gibsons are 100% within their moral rights to represent a Republic rather than a partitioned North. And that’s before we even consider players from the ‘other tradition’ such as George Best and Keith Gillespie who have said they would have liked the chance to play for a united Ireland team.
Many people are bit abroad to Irish parents and consider themselves Irish. That’s one thing. Then there are the ones who realise they’ll never play for England and suddenly discover their grandmother was from Mayo. I don’t honesty think Andy Townsend, Mark Lawrenson or John Aldridge ever called themselves Irishmen until Jack Charlton came calling. Then again, John Barnes is Jamaican, and Owen Hargreaves never lived in England until he played for them, so they can’t preach. And let’s not even get started on their Cricket team….
“Born” abroad – spellcheck