Stuck in the middle

Although Albania beating Russia meant it wasn’t as big a catastrophe as it might have been, I still think we’ll rue dropping those two points in Tirana. They’re not the soft touch that they used to be, sure, but if you’re going to qualify for major tournaments you have to beat teams like Albania.

Our big problem is the midfield. I don’t want to dig the Roy Keane thing up again, but we really could have done with him bossing things last week. Mark Kinsella and Matty Holland are both excellent club players, but I’m not sure that they’ve got what it takes to play at international level. It’s like, say, Ray Parlour who turns in excellent performances week in, week out for Arsenal but looks a bit stretched when he’s on England duty. Brian Kerr’s astute enough to know that he’s lacking four or five quality players, and will be going through every Premiership squad list to see who’s got Irish grandparents. With England resurgent at the moment, it’s a good time to say to an 18 or 19-year-old lad, “Declare for Ireland and we’ll have you in a green shirt next month.” That’s a tempting offer for a striker who knows that the England line’s going to be lead for the next 10 years by Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney. We had a lad at Aston Villa, Stephen Frogatt, who was about to declare for Ireland when he got an England call-up. Two caps later he was dropped and, that was it, international career over. If he’d played for Big Jack, he’d have probably gone to a World Cup.

Ireland’s the same as Scotland and Wales in that we’re going to go through periods where we don’t have enough world class players to sail through our qualifying groups. I don’t mean any disrespect to the current crop of lads, who are all talented professionals, but when I was playing for Ireland we were lucky enough to have a glut of centre-halves and some great midfielders. Where we weren’t so strong was up front, yet we managed to cope.

By and large, I thought we did okay against Georgia and Albania. Robbie Keane coming out to help the lads in the second game was commendable, and you can excuse him for not having one of his better games. I’d hoped for a little bit more from John O’Shea, but he wasn’t anywhere near as commanding as he has been for Manchester United.

Brian Kerr hasn’t said it publicly, but I know he’ll be upset that the lads didn’t come up with the goods against the Albanians. He did his part by getting the tactics and preparation right, so I don’t think any of the fault lies with him. The bottom line is we should have won the game, but lacked that little bit extra on the night. I’m convinced we’ll beat Albania at Lansdowne, though, and if we can take maximum points off Switzerland and Russia, we’re still in with a chance of qualifying.

I’d like to see Colin Healy moving to the Premiership and earning a place in the starting line-up. I’ve not seen much of Graham Barrett, but he’s a young lad who might be able to do a job for us. The great thing about Brian is he’s worked with all of the kids who we’re going to be looking to more and more over the next year.

There hasn’t been anything about it in England, but according to the Irish papers Damien Duff moving to Manchester United is a done deal. I’m sure he is one of the players who Alex Ferguson would like to bring to Old Trafford, finance permitting. If I was Alex, I’d sell Giggs, Butt, Veron and, if the price was around the £30 million mark, David Beckham. He’s a magnificent footballer but I swear to Christ, if somebody comes in with that sort of money I’d sell him. What would I do with the proceeds? Pay whatever it takes to prise Damien Duff away from Blackburn Rovers, bring in the Turkey keeper Rustu who was superb against England and buy Robbie Keane from Spurs. The way United play would suit Robbie down to the ground, and bring the extra 20% out in his game which I’m convinced is there.

He could also try kidnapping Wayne Rooney! I thought calling him “the new Pelé” was a little over the top, but he really was superb for England. Physique-wise he reminds me of a young Norman Whiteside. He’s strong, able to mix it when necessary and blessed with a great footballing brain.

Finally, good luck to Martin O’Neill and the boys against Boavista. Despite the Super Cally aberration and the 1-1 with Dundee United, I’m confident they’ll beat the Portuguese and go on to win the UEFA Cup. Which with United capable of doing the same in the Champions League, makes a nice little double for the gamblers out there!