Robbie Keane celebrates after the final whistle during the UEFA Euro 2016 Qualifying match at the Veltins-Arena, Gelsenkirchen. Joe Giddens/PA Wire/Press Association Images
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Opinion: Robbie Keane has been a great player, but it's time to give others a chance
The LA Galaxy striker was substituted after 63 minutes last night following an ineffectual display.
BASED PURELY ON international form at the very least, Robbie Keane is the greatest striker Ireland have ever produced.
The current top scorer in international football with 65 goals in 137 appearances, the next highest player after the LA Galaxy man in Irish footballing history is Niall Quinn with 21 goals — not even half the amount Keane has so far managed.
And though Frank Stapleton and John Aldridge could argue with the above assertion based on club form, neither came close to hitting the heights that the 34-year-old has managed with Ireland while playing mostly in weaker teams.
Yet last night against Germany, Keane was a pale shadow of the conspicuously exuberant 17-year-old who made his debut against the Czech Republic in March 1998.
Though it wasn’t entirely his fault — the rest of Irish attackers were hardly influential for much of the game — Keane barely touched the ball at all last night and Ireland’s gradual improvement coincided with the veteran striker’s substitution for Darron Gibson on 63 minutes.
There are a number of caveats, of course — Ireland may well still have equalised had, say, Aiden McGeady been sacrificed instead of the 34-year-old. There was always going to be an Irish reaction to the German goal.
But whatever way you look at it, Keane had a poor game at the Veltins-Arena.
The graphic above illustrates Keane’s first-half touches — a mere five, including one from the kick-off. It epitomises how abysmal Ireland were as an attacking force in the opening period. Keane simply didn’t have the energy to stamp his authority on the game, even if the service to the striker was more than a little inadequate.
Contrast it with the Germany-Scotland game, where the visitors — who have a similar calibre of player to Ireland — gave the German defence problems throughout the match, with Watford’s Ikechi Anya particularly influential and simply too fast for the likes of Jerome Boateng to deal with.
Nevertheless, for the first 70 minutes at least, Ireland offered minimal attacking threat and those same German defenders who had seemed so poor against Scotland were looking like world champions again.
A big issue was Keane’s lack of presence as a lone frontman. It’s been suggested that Wes Hoolahan is being overlooked as a result of his defensive deficiencies, but Keane is surely a bigger risk from that perspective. His inabilty to hold the ball up or carry it a substantial distance in the lone front-man role meant the pressure was seldom off the Irish backline. They had no out ball. Consequently, the German defence were unusually comfortable-looking while playing their high line, knowing that Keane didn’t have the pace to run in behind them, while a genuinely fast striker — Shane Long — was forced to watch proceedings from the sidelines.
There are, of course, legitimate arguments for Keane remaining in the team. His goalscoring prowess is the obvious and most routinely cited example. And if the Germany match was an anomaly, then his case would be strong.
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Yet too often recently, in the big games, Keane has produced the type of ineffectual display that was once again evident last night. His goals record can mask these problems to an extent, but when he isn’t scoring, he’s offering very little else to the side.
Gibraltar were so poor as to make the game, whereby the Dubliner hit a first-half hat-trick, virtually irrelevant. Georgia away, however, saw Keane replaced by Long in the 76th minute after another performance in which he contributed little. Unfortunately, this has been somewhat of a recurring theme in Ireland’s bigger games of late — recall how peripheral a figure Keane was at the 2012 Euros.
Of course, he still has a phenomenal scoring record, but since France in 2009 — arguably his zenith — in which Keane registered a superbly taken goal, as Ireland were denied a place at the World Cup thanks partially to Thierry Henry’s infamous helping hand.
Since then Ireland have played some of the best teams in the world competitively — Spain, Italy, Germany and others. Yet in the five years since that goal, in competitive matches, Keane has scored against the following teams — Andorra, Russia, Macedonia (3 times), Estonia (twice), Kazakhstan (twice), Faroe Islands, Sweden and Gibraltar.
Of those matches in recent years, Russia and Sweden are the only ones that can be classed as really big games that Ireland wouldn’t necessarily be expected to win. And to make matters worse, Keane’s goals turned out to be irrelevant, as the Boys in Green ended up being beaten on both occasions.
For the last time a Keane goal contributed to a positive result against a big team, you also have to look as far back as 2009, when Caleb Folan set up his late equaliser against Italy in Bari.
Two points jump out from all the above facts: 1. Keane is obviously still a key player for Ireland against the smaller sides, which is why Martin O’Neill should still strongly consider starting the striker in the home match with Georgia and away game against Gibraltar at the very least. 2. He is, as has often been argued by critics, much more effective playing off a big striker such as Folan.
Playing Keane up front on his own against a team of Germany’s calibre didn’t seem a wise move initially, and this suspicion was promptly backed up by his inept showing — just as had happened against Spain at the Euros, or in the Georgia away fixture. So if Martin O’Neill persists with the 4-5-1 formation, he surely needs a striker with greater mobility and presence than Keane offers.
All of which brings us to Shane Long. 11 goals in 49 appearances for Ireland is hardly appalling, but it’s decidedly worse than Keane’s ratio. Moreover, only one of those goals has come in a competitive fixture. But then, how many of those caps have been substitute appearances, such as his 15-minute cameo against Croatia at the Euros? How many of the games was he asked to do a job on the wing, rather than playing in his natural, preferred role?
Long is a confidence player and needs to know that he is the main man in order to thrive. Should Martin O’Neill belatedly place faith in him, then the Tipperary native could well build on the highly promising form that has earned him a £12million move to Southampton, even if he has shown it a little too sporadically for most Irish fans’ liking.
Keane being held in reserve could also pave the way for Wes Hoolahan’s entry into the starting XI for big matches, with O’Neill at the moment ostensibly reluctant to accommodate more than one small, skillful, ‘luxury’ player, who is the wrong end of 30, in the team.
Granted, Ireland may not have vastly superior alternatives to Keane, but how do we know for sure unless others are given a chance? Consequently, although it seems harsh given what he’s achieved, it’s time the star’s monopoly on the Ireland striker’s jersey comes to an end.
Ireland must be brave and pick Hoolahan
Yes, I am aware of the irony of calling for the dropping of an ageing star who plays his club football at a low level, while recommending the introduction of another Irish player who fits this description.
The big difference is that Keane failed to cause the Germans trouble despite being on the field for over an hour, while Hoolahan made an impact with less than 15 minutes of game time.
In a recent interview with RTÉ, John Delaney spoke of players “not being afraid to make a mistake” and “learning to love the ball”.
Hoolahan is one of the few players in the current Irish squad that these traits could genuinely apply to, so it’s about time Irish football practised what it preaches, by playing the ex-Shelbourne midfielder in games that matter from the start.
Many people, including this writer, questioned whether Hull’s David Meyler could cope with playing in the relatively unfamiliar position of right-back against the world champions.
Prior to last night, Meyler had no experience of playing the role at that level (Gibraltar, of course, doesn’t apply).
Yet the 25-year-old Cork native silenced critics with a mature and disciplined display, and he was part of a backline which, for the most part, excelled as a unit, as Ireland kept world-class attackers such as Thomas Müller and Mario Götze at bay.
Significance of result should not be downplayed
Yes, Germany were missing some key players to injury. And granted, they didn’t reach the heights they hit at the World Cup.
But they still had five of the team that started the World Cup final, in addition to Götze – the substitute who scored the winning goal.
Moreover, the hosts still were able to dominate possession and control the play in the same masterful manner that was frequently apparent in the summer.
Yet for Ireland, who were missing key players themselves, to draw against Germany, who haven’t lost at home since 2007 and who only two years ago crushed the Boys in Green 6-1 at the Aviva Stadium, will rightly go down as one of the country’s best results ever, irrespective of what happens in the group from hereon in.
Opinion: Robbie Keane has been a great player, but it's time to give others a chance
BASED PURELY ON international form at the very least, Robbie Keane is the greatest striker Ireland have ever produced.
The current top scorer in international football with 65 goals in 137 appearances, the next highest player after the LA Galaxy man in Irish footballing history is Niall Quinn with 21 goals — not even half the amount Keane has so far managed.
And though Frank Stapleton and John Aldridge could argue with the above assertion based on club form, neither came close to hitting the heights that the 34-year-old has managed with Ireland while playing mostly in weaker teams.
Yet last night against Germany, Keane was a pale shadow of the conspicuously exuberant 17-year-old who made his debut against the Czech Republic in March 1998.
Though it wasn’t entirely his fault — the rest of Irish attackers were hardly influential for much of the game — Keane barely touched the ball at all last night and Ireland’s gradual improvement coincided with the veteran striker’s substitution for Darron Gibson on 63 minutes.
There are a number of caveats, of course — Ireland may well still have equalised had, say, Aiden McGeady been sacrificed instead of the 34-year-old. There was always going to be an Irish reaction to the German goal.
But whatever way you look at it, Keane had a poor game at the Veltins-Arena.
The graphic above illustrates Keane’s first-half touches — a mere five, including one from the kick-off. It epitomises how abysmal Ireland were as an attacking force in the opening period. Keane simply didn’t have the energy to stamp his authority on the game, even if the service to the striker was more than a little inadequate.
Contrast it with the Germany-Scotland game, where the visitors — who have a similar calibre of player to Ireland — gave the German defence problems throughout the match, with Watford’s Ikechi Anya particularly influential and simply too fast for the likes of Jerome Boateng to deal with.
Nevertheless, for the first 70 minutes at least, Ireland offered minimal attacking threat and those same German defenders who had seemed so poor against Scotland were looking like world champions again.
A big issue was Keane’s lack of presence as a lone frontman. It’s been suggested that Wes Hoolahan is being overlooked as a result of his defensive deficiencies, but Keane is surely a bigger risk from that perspective. His inabilty to hold the ball up or carry it a substantial distance in the lone front-man role meant the pressure was seldom off the Irish backline. They had no out ball. Consequently, the German defence were unusually comfortable-looking while playing their high line, knowing that Keane didn’t have the pace to run in behind them, while a genuinely fast striker — Shane Long — was forced to watch proceedings from the sidelines.
There are, of course, legitimate arguments for Keane remaining in the team. His goalscoring prowess is the obvious and most routinely cited example. And if the Germany match was an anomaly, then his case would be strong.
Yet too often recently, in the big games, Keane has produced the type of ineffectual display that was once again evident last night. His goals record can mask these problems to an extent, but when he isn’t scoring, he’s offering very little else to the side.
Gibraltar were so poor as to make the game, whereby the Dubliner hit a first-half hat-trick, virtually irrelevant. Georgia away, however, saw Keane replaced by Long in the 76th minute after another performance in which he contributed little. Unfortunately, this has been somewhat of a recurring theme in Ireland’s bigger games of late — recall how peripheral a figure Keane was at the 2012 Euros.
Of course, he still has a phenomenal scoring record, but since France in 2009 — arguably his zenith — in which Keane registered a superbly taken goal, as Ireland were denied a place at the World Cup thanks partially to Thierry Henry’s infamous helping hand.
Since then Ireland have played some of the best teams in the world competitively — Spain, Italy, Germany and others. Yet in the five years since that goal, in competitive matches, Keane has scored against the following teams — Andorra, Russia, Macedonia (3 times), Estonia (twice), Kazakhstan (twice), Faroe Islands, Sweden and Gibraltar.
Of those matches in recent years, Russia and Sweden are the only ones that can be classed as really big games that Ireland wouldn’t necessarily be expected to win. And to make matters worse, Keane’s goals turned out to be irrelevant, as the Boys in Green ended up being beaten on both occasions.
For the last time a Keane goal contributed to a positive result against a big team, you also have to look as far back as 2009, when Caleb Folan set up his late equaliser against Italy in Bari.
Two points jump out from all the above facts: 1. Keane is obviously still a key player for Ireland against the smaller sides, which is why Martin O’Neill should still strongly consider starting the striker in the home match with Georgia and away game against Gibraltar at the very least. 2. He is, as has often been argued by critics, much more effective playing off a big striker such as Folan.
Playing Keane up front on his own against a team of Germany’s calibre didn’t seem a wise move initially, and this suspicion was promptly backed up by his inept showing — just as had happened against Spain at the Euros, or in the Georgia away fixture. So if Martin O’Neill persists with the 4-5-1 formation, he surely needs a striker with greater mobility and presence than Keane offers.
All of which brings us to Shane Long. 11 goals in 49 appearances for Ireland is hardly appalling, but it’s decidedly worse than Keane’s ratio. Moreover, only one of those goals has come in a competitive fixture. But then, how many of those caps have been substitute appearances, such as his 15-minute cameo against Croatia at the Euros? How many of the games was he asked to do a job on the wing, rather than playing in his natural, preferred role?
Long is a confidence player and needs to know that he is the main man in order to thrive. Should Martin O’Neill belatedly place faith in him, then the Tipperary native could well build on the highly promising form that has earned him a £12million move to Southampton, even if he has shown it a little too sporadically for most Irish fans’ liking.
Keane being held in reserve could also pave the way for Wes Hoolahan’s entry into the starting XI for big matches, with O’Neill at the moment ostensibly reluctant to accommodate more than one small, skillful, ‘luxury’ player, who is the wrong end of 30, in the team.
Granted, Ireland may not have vastly superior alternatives to Keane, but how do we know for sure unless others are given a chance? Consequently, although it seems harsh given what he’s achieved, it’s time the star’s monopoly on the Ireland striker’s jersey comes to an end.
Ireland must be brave and pick Hoolahan
Yes, I am aware of the irony of calling for the dropping of an ageing star who plays his club football at a low level, while recommending the introduction of another Irish player who fits this description.
The big difference is that Keane failed to cause the Germans trouble despite being on the field for over an hour, while Hoolahan made an impact with less than 15 minutes of game time.
In a recent interview with RTÉ, John Delaney spoke of players “not being afraid to make a mistake” and “learning to love the ball”.
Hoolahan is one of the few players in the current Irish squad that these traits could genuinely apply to, so it’s about time Irish football practised what it preaches, by playing the ex-Shelbourne midfielder in games that matter from the start.
Meyler comes of age
Many people, including this writer, questioned whether Hull’s David Meyler could cope with playing in the relatively unfamiliar position of right-back against the world champions.
Prior to last night, Meyler had no experience of playing the role at that level (Gibraltar, of course, doesn’t apply).
Yet the 25-year-old Cork native silenced critics with a mature and disciplined display, and he was part of a backline which, for the most part, excelled as a unit, as Ireland kept world-class attackers such as Thomas Müller and Mario Götze at bay.
Significance of result should not be downplayed
Yes, Germany were missing some key players to injury. And granted, they didn’t reach the heights they hit at the World Cup.
But they still had five of the team that started the World Cup final, in addition to Götze – the substitute who scored the winning goal.
Moreover, the hosts still were able to dominate possession and control the play in the same masterful manner that was frequently apparent in the summer.
Yet for Ireland, who were missing key players themselves, to draw against Germany, who haven’t lost at home since 2007 and who only two years ago crushed the Boys in Green 6-1 at the Aviva Stadium, will rightly go down as one of the country’s best results ever, irrespective of what happens in the group from hereon in.
Player ratings: Here’s how the Boys in Green fared against Germany>
‘When Glenn Whelan went off, there was a transformation’ – the RTÉ panel on tonight’s match>
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alternatives Editor's picks John O'Shea Niall Quinn Robbie Keane Germany Ireland Republic Wes Hoolahan