Kerr's chicken approach could come home to roost
If Ireland don't qualify for the 2006 World Cup, Brian Kerr will be to blame, argues Paul Doyle.
Wednesday March 30, 2005
"What more hardship can a boy endure
than to be sat down behind the door,
and on his knees
no jug of punch,
and on his knees
no tidy wench"
- traditional Irish ditty
What more hardship? How about being sat behind the door and on his face, lots of egg, and on his face, a baffled frown. That could be Republic of Ireland manager Brian Kerr next October, after being run out of the job of his dreams for contriving to miss out on the 2006 World Cup. And let's be clear: if Ireland don't make it to Germany, then Kerr will certainly deserve his dismissal.
The problem is this: under Mick McCarthy the Irish played with confidence, under Kerr they play with fear. That was never more obvious than in last Saturday's foolish draw in Israel, the latest in a sorry series of almost-scandalous Irish surrenders under the Dubliner.
Until Kerr's reign, the most cowardly Irish performance of modern times had come in Zagreb in the qualifiers for Euro 2000. Three days after a swashbuckling 2-1 victory over an excellent Yugoslav side in Lansdowne Road, McCarthy took his men to Croatia effectively needing only a draw qualify for his first major tournament as a manager. Astonishingly, he chose to drop Robbie Keane, who had been sensational against the Yugoslavs, and deployed a 4-5-1 formation with the role of lone striker going to a creaking 37-year-old Tony Cascarino who, like Clinton Morrison against Israel last Saturday, was knackered after 20 minutes but wasn't replaced until the very end.
Operation infernal injustice wasn't thwarted until the second minute of injury time, when the visitors, who had spent the entire match in their own half, conceded what the Irish media brazenly branded a Suker-punch - Davor Suker pouncing to steal three points for the side that had spent the previous 91 minutes pummelling their visitors.
That defeat meant Ireland had to win their last match in Macedonia and they seemed on course to do just that when Niall Quinn fired them into the lead. However, the lesson of Zagreb still hadn't percolated into McCarthy's notoriously stubborn mind and rather than continue to assert their blatant superiority, they retreated and piled sandbags in front of their goal, inviting pressure that led, just like in Israel last Saturday, to another injury-time concession.
McCarthy could plausibly claim to have an excuse for such caution - he was a member of the Irish squad that was pipped by England to qualification for Euro 92 after carefree attacking saw them squander a 3-1 lead in Poland to draw 3-3.
His reaction to that was too extreme though and after the light finally dawned on him, a bold-but-not-reckless Ireland marched to Korea/Japan 2002. Kerr seems to have missed that last development.
Kerr was lucky to escape criticism for Ireland's failure to reach Euro 2004. The local media, which had campaigned long and loud for his appointment, insisted he had done as well as could be expected by guiding the team to third in the group after McCarthy had led them to defeats in their opening two games. That was a convenient excuse, but one that was nullified when Ireland's two main rivals, Russia and Switzerland, suffered surprise defeats themselves: by the time the Irish came to play them again, direct qualification was a distinct possibility, and a place in the play-offs the least that could be expected.
Instead, a listless Ireland drew with a ragged Russian side in Dublin and then lumbered over to Switzerland to deliver the most soulless Irish display in living memory on the way to a 2-0 defeat. Palpably, Kerr failed to motivate his men.
There were at least some promising signs ahead of the 2006 campaign. Not only had Kerr worked on one of the areas that McCarthy strangely neglected - set-pieces - but he also hinted that he'd picked up on at least one lesson the previous administration had learned, that playing your main group rivals away in the first few games can give a valuable advantage. Nevertheless, fans still awaited proof that Kerr could inject the sort of virility Irish teams had traditionally played with.
A facile 3-0 win over Cyprus didn't teach anyone much, so it wasn't until Ireland's second group game, in Switzerland, that worries began to fester. Just as in Israel last Saturday, Morrison gave the Irish an early lead against a team with a visibly shaky defence but then, inexplicably, they panicked and for the next 30 minutes were torn apart by drifting Swiss playmaker, Hakan Yakin, who operated unperturbed in the no-man's land between the uncharacteristically bemused Roy Keane and Kenny Cunningham. Only the agility of Shay Given saved Ireland from conceding more than one.
At half-time, the Irish belatedly came up with a plan for stifling Yakin, and once that was achieved it was the Boys in Green who enjoyed most possession and the rickety Swiss defenders who looked closest to collapse. Yet with victory in sight, the Irish refused to attack in earnest and seemed oddly content to let the game fizzle out into a draw. Two points lost.
Would it be too harsh to say that Ireland's 0-0 draw in their next match, against France in Paris, was also two points lost? No, it was undoubtedly an opportunity spurned. Helped in part by Raymond Domenech's decision to rile Claude Makelele into retirement, the French fielded an inexperienced midfield featuring 20-year-old debutant Rio Mavuba and frankly rubbish Alou Diarra. Roy Keane and Kevin "Zinedine" Kilbane had little trouble claiming the middle of the park for Ireland. Damien Duff was exhilarating down the left and Steve Finnan was in incisive form down the right, but again, Kerr clearly instructed his men to hold their fire and the chance to deal a critical blow to the group favourites was passed up.
Domenech's troops have drawn all of their home group matches 0-0 and if Kerr had invested Ireland with the courage to seize opportunities as they were presented to them, then the French would be effectively be out. Instead, Les Bleus go into tonight's match in Israel knowing that victory - which they will certainly secure even if David Trezeguet and Sylvain Wiltord continue their competition to see who can miss the most sitters in a campaign - will send them three points clear at the top of the group.
True, France, like Switzerland and the inept Israelis, still have to go to Dublin, where Kerr has an impressive record: 12 wins, four draws and no defeats. That record, however, was amassed mainly because Kerr takes friendlies more seriously than almost any other manager in the world. In his only true test at Lansdowne Road - against Russia when it mattered - Kerr's team flopped. And that has since become a bad habit. He'd better kick it quick.
