GIVEN THE ABSENCE of any exiled hero nowadays the only tension at an Irish squad announcement is usually that between Stephen Kenny’s natural positivity and the welter of misfortunes and dissatisfactions that afflict his squad.
So it proved today, when Kenny announced his 25-man selection for the Euro 2024 qualifiers against Greece and Gibraltar later this month. Ireland are heading to Antalya for a nine-day training camp before travelling to Athens for a stress-test against Greece. After three years under Stephen Kenny, are Ireland good enough to win a game away to a side with whom they share a broadly similar level?
The biggest problem for Ireland ahead of the game is the fact those who play regularly for their clubs have run out of games while many of those who have had games have run out of opportunities to play.
Of the 25 players selected today, only nine will have completed at least 90 minutes of first-team football in the month before kick-off against Greece on 16 June.
Of that nine, two are hitherto substitute goalkeepers (Caoimhin Kelleher and Mark Travers), another two are uncapped (Liam Scales and Jack Taylor) and only three (Evan Ferguson, Nathan Collins, and Mikey Johnston) featured against France in March.
The Championship and League One seasons ended on the second Monday in May, fully 39 days prior to kick-off in Athens. That stretch is one-third of their off-season.
That means all of Mark Sykes, Callum O’Dowda, James McClean, John Egan, Dara O’Shea, Josh Cullen, Jayson Molumby, Jeff Hendrick, Will Smallbone, Jason Knight, Adam Idah, Michael Obafemi, and Troy Parrott have been oxidising for three weeks at this point. At least six from that list will start in Athens.
Darragh Lenihan (Middlesbrough) and Jack Taylor (Peterbrough) squeezed another week out of their seasons in the play-offs, though neither reached Wembley.
Burnt already by the torpor of that awful 1-0 loss to Armenia last summer, Kenny arranged a four-day training camp in Bristol last week for these players to keep sharp, while all have been given individual programmes to keep them ticking over prior to departure for Turkey. The nine-day camp will feature an internal 11v11 game.
There are some injury problems too, with Seamus Coleman, Callum Robinson, Andrew Omobamidele, and Chiedozie Ogbene all out. Alan Browne is in but hasn’t played since April with a knee ligament issue, so he may not be ready for full sessions from the off in Antalya. Ryan Manning – whose regular absences have made him a Wes Hoolahan for Gen Zers – was called up but wasn’t available for personal reasons that don’t preclude him from future involvement under Kenny.
In Scotland, Jamie McGrath and Liam Scales remained central for Dundee United and Aberdeen respectively up to the end of their seasons last weekend, although both are down the pecking order in terms of Irish selection.
There are five Premier League players named in the squad, and Evan Ferguson’s breakout season has been the single great positive of the year. His minutes in the season run-in were managed because of an ankle ligament problem that does not threaten his involvement against Greece.
Nathan Collins, meanwhile, played the final two games of Wolves’ season having lost his place in the team to Craig Dawson after Julen Lopetegui’s switch to a back four.
The remaining Premier League trio are the goalkeepers. Caoimhin Kelleher and Mark Travers spent much of the season – in Kelleher’s case, all of the season – on the bench for Liverpool and Bournemouth, but both played on the final day of the season. Travers was deemed to have impressed in the 1-0 loss at Everton, while Kelleher will grimace at the highlights of Liverpool’s 4-4 draw with Southampton.
Jurgen Klopp says he can’t see Kelleher leaving Liverpool this summer but Kenny says he will.
“I would fully expect it”, said Kenny of a potential move. “It’s not right normally to speak about a player moving, but he’s at the stage where he’s behind probably one of the best goalkeepers in the world and it’s not going to get any easier.
“He can’t afford not playing. He knows that and he’s known that for a while. It’s not easy. There’s a process you go through with a club like that and I think and it wouldn’t be a surprise for him to move in the summer and he knows that. I think he’s ready to go and play regularly because he needs to.”
To now, Kelleher and Gavin Bazunu have been a case study in different paths: where Kelleher stayed at Liverpool, Bazunu left Man City. Neither path has been free of obstacle.
Bazunu’s debut season in the Premier League with Southampton won’t be instantly followed by another, however, as Southampton went down and he was dropped for the final six games of the season.
The highest-profile analysis of Southampton’s season came from Jamie Carragher on Monday Night Football, who excavated a few unflattering stats and pointed the finger squarely at Bazunu. After a brutal introduction to the top-flight, might his confidence be an issue ahead of these games?
“That’s the good thing about this training camp in Turkey”, said Kenny. “It certainly gives us the opportunity to evaluate all of that but I don’t see it. I spoke to him after the last game on Sunday. ‘How are you doing What are you up to?’ He said he was just going to play a few rounds of golf with friends, take a few days, and then he will be ready.”
The remaining two players in the Irish squad are playing in Europe, through playing is sadly not the apt phrase to describe Matt Doherty’s situation at Atletico Madrid. He has managed only eight minutes off the bench against Cadiz in La Liga since Ireland’s defeat to France, though there is some hope he will play on the final day against Villarreal on Sunday.
“It’s not a perfect scenario at all”, said Kenny. “I’m sure when he took that move he knew he would find it hard for games but he thought he would play an amount of games, for sure. He couldn’t have envisaged that he wouldn’t play at all. That was frustrating for him and tough mentally to deal with.”
Mikey Johnston, however, has played the bulk of Vitória Guimarães’ final six games in Portugal, up to and including last weekend. He will report for duty with a match sharpness that is regrettably not general across the rest of the squad.
