June 12, 2005
Ireland can afford no more slips
DAVID MCKECHNIE
Brian Kerr's team are still in with a fighting chance of topping Group Four but their weakness in depth must worry the manager
When news reached the Ireland dressing room after Wednesday’s match in Torshavn that the players were marooned there for another night, they reacted angrily and desperately. “Get Milo!” shouted one, apparently in all sincerity, and others laughed at the notion that the FAI president, Milo Corcoran, might be able to transform his blazer into a cape and lift the fog over the Norwegian Sea all by himself.
There was nothing for it but to unwind in a bar, retreat to the hotel and try to regain their perspective. For these players it was asking a lot during a week when a sense of perspective got it in the neck. The nature of the turnaround against Israel blew away Ireland’s optimism, their sense of invincibility at Lansdowne Road and seemingly all hope of finishing top of Group Four.
Nonetheless, in the months before Ireland line out against France at Lansdowne Road, it would be a wonder if perspective failed to recover to shine a kinder light on Group Four. It would be a surprise if Ireland dwelt on their failings against Israel instead of considering an unbeaten home record in World Cup qualifiers that stretches back 12 years and it would be a shock if they couldn’t recall the performances that brought them to the 2002 World Cup and initially put them in such a promising position in these qualifiers. Pedigree should be more lasting and relevant than form in these campaigns.
Football has developed a culture of one-eyed extremism and so it’s natural for Ireland fans to exaggerate their team’s failings as though they have a monopoly on the troubles in Group Four. Would Ireland swap places with the Swiss, who must face France in Berne and then travel to Dublin within the space of four days? Would they prefer to be France, who have shown over a long period that they have deteriorated under Raymond Domenech, who have scored less than a goal a game in this group, yet who must travel to play their two main rivals away from home? “If someone told us before the group we’d be top at this stage with this number of points we’d have laughed,” said Kenny Cunningham on Friday. “Experience tells you there will be ups and downs in a qualifying group, you have to take it on the chin. The week was a disappointment but we’re professional enough, the summer will help. Physically we’ll be at our peak and I think we’ll be ready.”
The only ones to have excelled themselves in Group Four are the Israelis, who are floating on a cloud of elation out of keeping with their poor display at Lansdowne Road and their real prospects of progressing to Germany. As his team’s coach made its way to last Saturday’s game, Avraham Grant, the Israel manager, had the inspired idea of showing a tape of Liverpool’s Champions League final comeback, uncanny considering the events about to unfold. As the players waited in Heathrow airport on the way home last Sunday, Yossi Benayoun drew the comparison. “For a team like Israel to pull off something like this at a stadium like Lansdowne Road is an even greater achievement,” he said. Grant concurred. “This team is driving Europe crazy,” he reckoned. Brian Kerr could not disagree.
KERR may have been driven more demented by his own players last weekend but, in light of the criticism that came his way after the first-half substitution he made, he may also have considered the comparison with the Liverpool-Milan match.
A manager’s performance can be judged in two ways: how he prepares his team before a game and how he reacts during it. Analysis of Ireland’s playing options in the autumn can wait for another day but this is the time to consider how the manager has employed them so far. Given how well Ireland have started all of their matches in this qualifying group — four times they have scored in the first 14 minutes — Kerr is entitled to feel his pre-match preparation and team selections have been vindicated. He might also feel that before last weekend, at least, he had proved himself adept at introducing his substitutes and altering his tactics.
He might think back to Basel, for instance, at the adjustments he made at half time after Hakan Yakin had cancelled out Clinton Morrison’s opening goal and Switzerland threatened to take control of the match. “We spoke at half time about playing narrow and trying to make them play wide,” said Steve Finnan, “and they didn’t really get through us in the second half.”
Switzerland had just one shot on goal after the break that night, while the introduction of Graham Kavanagh for Andy Reid with 17 minutes remaining essentially killed the game. While it was hardly a virtuoso performance by Kerr, it boosted the impression of a manager skilled enough to instruct and influence his players wisely.
Wednesday’s clumsy win in the Faroes may have lifted Ireland to the top of the group but last weekend’s game against Israel was the most damaging of Kerr’s tenure and the most worthy of scrutiny. His introduction of Kavanagh for Robbie Keane and subsequent reshuffle plainly didn’t work. Damien Duff was ineffective up front, Kevin Kilbane neutralised on the left and Kavanagh and Matt Holland looked like two men politely trying to carry out the same job.
But what were Kerr’s alternatives? Should he have introduced Gary Doherty so early and changed the playing style that had worked so well up to that point? Should he have brought on Stephen Elliott, who Kerr later claimed had lost his sharpness since the season ended? It is unarguable that however far he might have been off the pace — and his display on Wednesday suggested it might not have been far at all — Elliott’s introduction would have caused the least disruption. But was it really so ridiculous for Kerr to believe that Duff could thrive up front, where he has played many times for Ireland, or that Kilbane could offer a real alternative in a position where he has earned the majority of his 63 caps? Whichever way you look at it, when Robbie Keane left the pitch after 26 minutes last Saturday, the Irish players were guilty of bringing to life one of football’s most overused cliches — letting down their manager.
Kerr’s sense of betrayal was impossible to conceal after the match, for he knows what it really means when it is said that players let a manager down. It means they are prepared to let him down. For all the progress he has made, Kerr hasn’t yet created the conditions in which his players aren’t prepared to let him down. Where they simply won’t allow it, no matter what. Perhaps they react sluggishly to his cautious, forensic approach, perhaps they don’t fear him enough. The quality of their performances in Paris and in the first 25 minutes against Israel were no illusion, but Kerr has yet to prove beyond doubt that he is capable of getting the very best from these players, the one and only job of any Ireland manager.
As this campaign has shuffled along, one other fact has become more and more obvious; without Kerr’s three blue-chip outfield players — Damien Duff, Roy and Robbie Keane — fit and available, Ireland lose their conviction and their way. In those ruinous minutes before half time last Saturday, two of them were off the field and the third was struggling out of position. Ireland’s margin of error has shrunk so much in Group Four that the loss of even one of them in the autumn could be terminal.
Nobody needs to remind Kerr of this stark fact but, when the dust settles on the past week and he calmly considers the challenge to come, it may be the thought that troubles him most.
Originally Posted by dancinpants
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