I'd say scoring against what is essentially a village team would be more of a minimum requirement than a confidence builder to be honest!
I'd say scoring against what is essentially a village team would be more of a minimum requirement than a confidence builder to be honest!
Caught the last 25 minutes of Celtic’s draw with Bologna. I thought Kenny did a lot of good things in his time on the pitch. We all know the limitations to his game but he’s not without useful attributes. He’s a very willing runner, he’s strong, he’s genuinely quick, he battles, he’s got a bit of a spark about him, he doesn’t mind leaving a tackle on someone. Wouldn’t mind him in the squad, depending on injuries, et cetera.
Scales was also really good in that time and MON made a point of hailing him after the game
Far too many writing off Kenny based on the basket case that has been Celtic in his time there. His only cameo for Ireland was positive. Not saying he'll go on to much bigger things, or even become Celtics main man, but a good manager will do wonders for him imop. The improvement in his game from his first to second season with Rovers was staggering.Originally Posted by elatedscum
If he never plays for Ireland again, he can always say he played in one of the greatest ever Irish performances
I actually think that will be a notable thing when people look back on the game in the future when Kenny is 29 and playing for Doncaster or wherever, a sense of "how the hell did he end up being involved in that game?"
He could be this generation's Caleb Folan
Folding my way into the big money!!!
That's a competitive category.
Is he injured or just dropped from matchday squad completely?
Folding my way into the big money!!!
Injured
Who have we had up front in the last few years now? Will Keane, James Collins, Ronan Curtis, Scott Hogan. All probably worthy of the caps they got at the time, and yet all reflective of the absolute paucity of options we've had lately.
Aaron Connolly and Adam Idah rank a bit ahead of the others, but if we're honest they're also not much good. Thank God for Troy Parrott, and touch wood Evan Ferguson can get back to form.
Edit you can add Sinclair Armstrong, Jonathan Afolabi (not capped, but called up) and even Michael Obafemi to that list too. Armstrong isn't quite a write-off, but he's never yet shown any real form in senior football. Obafemi probably is a write-off at this stage, despite having shown some decent form both at club and national level.
Last edited by pineapple stu; 26/01/2026 at 10:29 AM.
We've had an absolute boat load of young strikers come through. It just shows how many you need to produce just to get one or two good ones. Neither Scotland or the north have produced a genuinely top level striker in decades.
Parrott looks like he has what it takes, Ferguson could still go either way between form and injuries but he's young enough that there's hope. Unfortunately I don't think Idah will ever be much better than he currently is - he has the attributes but not the brain. I haven't completely given up on Cannon yet, he could still be a useful squad option if utilised correctly. If Armstrong could add goals to his game he'd be amazing, but that's about the biggest "if" you can have as a striker. The rest can be written off at this point unfortunately, including Kenny despite his age. He's absolutely hopeless in front of goal unfortunately.
Obafemi is the most frustrating one for me. Bags of ability. Connolly looked very promising at one point as well.
Still, there were people writing off Parrott and now he's the Messiah. Not you stu, but there are people who tend to judge players based on seeing them once or twice or some bad transfer moves they've taken. Or people just have a chip on their shoulder because of where a player came from or a team he played for etc. Players can have bad seasons and bounce back, particularly at a young age. Not saying on any your list will as a few seem to have mental issues that will probably always hold them back, but we've gotten mileage out of late bloomers before.
Kenny probably needs to get out of Celtic and into a team that doesn't go from not playing him at all, to relying on him to rescue their season. Really hoping Noonan has the sense to go elsewhere. Environment is critical.
22 leagues and 26 cups and....well....none of you will ever catch up if we're being honest.
I think Parrott got a bit of stick because he seemed to stall for a while - mainly because he was being capped way too young. The Spurs breakthrough under Mourinho didn't really help I guess. But he had 20 caps before he should have gotten 1 - not his fault, as the alternative was Curtis, Collins, etc.
I do think Kenny will have a half-decent career, but that Celtic is a level too high for him. That reflects more on Celtic's recruitment than him though.
I'm not sure there was much wrong with them recruiting a kid with potential. I don't think they've handled anything else well apart from the loan to us though. My opinion when they did sign him was actually more in line with yours. He didn't perform against us in the LoI while at Sligo and I didn't see the potential myself. But then he went on to improve massively in his second season with us which shows there was a higher ceiling. Has he hit it already? Maybe. Maybe not. His minutes to goals ratio is 172 in the SPL I think. He's missed boatloads so if he finds his confidence again it's not mad to say he could improve that to a very good level. Again, I'm not saying he will go on to succeed at Celtic, but a kid who can go into the Conference League and score against the likes of Rapid Vienna isn't one we should write off because of his performances for a basket case club like Celtic are currently.
Although if we are purely speculating that he won't be Irelands main striker in the near future, then that's probably more fair. But writing a lad off completely based on his time at Celtic would be pretty foolish. Bosun Lawal had to get out of there to develop for example.
22 leagues and 26 cups and....well....none of you will ever catch up if we're being honest.
For sure - the issue is that their lack of recruitment means he's now a first-team regular when he probably shouldn't be. They didn't replace Kyogo or Kuhn or even Idah really, and that's arguably cost them a place in the CL group (two 0-0 draws with Kairat) and they're not even top scorers in the SPL this season (albeit how much of that is down to Nancy and how much to the lack of options up front is up for debate)
Ah sorry, yes absolutely. They have made a complete balls of it. Kenny shouldn't have ended up as their main striker. Far too much pressure for a confidence player. He almost pulled it off with MON in charge the first time but Nancy....well he wasn't the only one who performed pretty poorly during that "spell".
Be interesting to see where he goes next. A loan back to us to find his form again would be lovely, but I'd imagine Celtic will want to get their money for him. Contracted til 2029.
22 leagues and 26 cups and....well....none of you will ever catch up if we're being honest.
I can see him going to League 1 in the summer once Celtic get some alternatives in (not that the alternatives will necessarily be any better knowing them). There was interest from Bolton in the past. That would be a level at which it would be possible to get a clearer read on him. It may well turn out to be the right level for him but, if it is, that's of no use to Ireland.
Iheanacho was brought in to be the main striker on massive wages because Rogers had worked with him before and wanted to bring him in. he's just been both bad and injured
He still scored a couple of goals in that time: Scotland, Hungary, Andorra; so worthy of his place I feel.
Folding my way into the big money!!!
He was actually fine for Ireland at that point, it was his club form that was the issue. He never did crack the Championship, had failed loans at Millwall, Ipswich and Preston without success. Some turnaround in the last 18 months.
Tangental but... I can only really remember two negative moments early in Troy's career. The draw against Azerbaijan, he was dreadful. He was playing right wing. Connolly got hooked at half time instead of him, but he was much worse. That was his first bad game, but he was playing out of position.
Second was more of an individual influential moment: drawing 1-1 with Scotland. Obafemi and him break up the pitch. Obafemi plays the perfect pass and he's 1 on 1 v Gordon and misses (see 4.45 below).
Alan Browne gives away a penalty with a crazy handball and Scotland go on to win it. Sliding doors moment for Stephen Kenny after the Scotland 3-0 win in the previous camp. That result ends up putting us in a group with Netherlands, France and Greece and ensures we don't have a backdoor to qualification via playoff.
In general, most of Parrott's caps have come off the bench to be honest. 33 caps but only 1455 minutes, which is enough for 16 games.
Also means he's scoring a goal every 146 minutes for Ireland or 0.62 goals per 90 from age 17 up. Robbie Keane scored 1 goal every 165 mins or 0.54 goals per 90
Evan is at a goal every 195 mins or 0.46 per 90.
Saying that, Evan is 2 and a half years younger than Troy and Troy was at a goal every 203 minutes at Evan's age or 0.44 goals per 90. Robbie was at a goal every in 268 mins at that age or 0.34 goals per min at Evan's age. Purely from a numbers perspective, it looks like we might have two generational strikers arriving at the same time. I'd suspect both will comfortably beat Niall Quinn's second place but because both are around at the same time, neither will get close to Robbie.
Last edited by tetsujin1979; 27/01/2026 at 11:46 PM. Reason: Embedded video
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