Ireland Squad v Holland

[therock67]

Ireland squad for Holland match:

Shay Given
Paddy Kenny
Wayne Henderson

Ian Harte
Steve Finnan
Stephen Carr
Stephen Kelly
Andy O’Brien
Richard Dunne
John O’Shea

Liam Miller
Steven Reid
Graham Kavanagh
Stephen Ireland
Kevin Kilbane
Alan O’Brien
Aiden McGeady
Damien Duff

Terry Dixon
Kevin Doyle
Clinton Morrison
Alan Lee
Stephen Elliott
Robbie Keane

Is Joey O'Brien injured? I'd be very disappointed if he was dropped for Carr. He's also a better player than Kelly I think. Great chance for McGeady to grab a place in the team. There's not many ahead of him at the moment.

[cully]

actually thought it was the squad to play the ODI v Holland that's on today !

[lyonsee]

Yup, Joey O'Brien is injured. Presumably, Stevie Ireland is too?

Anybody know anything about Alan O'Brien?

From what I've read on the internet, Owen Garvan of Ipswich is the next great big hope but no place for him as of yet.

[steamboatsam]

lyonsee said:

Yup, Joey O'Brien is injured. Presumably, Stevie Ireland is too?

if he is then he did well to make the squad!

[bandage]

My that's a poor squad imo. There doesn't seem to any strength in depth at all. Never heard of Alan O'Brien and still can't fathom why that Dixon lad is in the squad. What's Finnan's injury? Agreed re McGeady - a 451/433 with Duff and McGeady on the flanks could work.

[briantinnion]

Garvan is suffering from shingles and is likely to be out for the next few weeks, pity because this is a big season for him. Just hope he doesn't suffer from second season syndrome.

Can't fathom Dixon being in that squad, the child has only just played his first reserve for Spurs, would have had Shane Long in ahead of him. Alan O'Brien is a bizarre inclusion also, as far as I know he has yet to start a competitive game for Newcastle.

Look to have fcuk all centre back cover as well, he's obviously viewing JOSH and possibly Kilbane and Stephen Kelly as cover. I'm giving up on Kelly, had high hopes for him but he's gone off the boil and was mediocre on Saturday against Colchester from what I heard.

Anyway I'd like to see the following team start against the Dutch:

Given GK
Finnan DR
Dunne DC
O'Brien DC
Kilbane DL
McGeady MR
Ireland MC
Reid MC
Duff ML
Keane FC
Doyle FC

Bit lightweight in midfield but like to see how it would go.

I bet Ballack is sh!tting himself.

[lyonsee]

steamboatsam said:

lyonsee said:

Yup, Joey O'Brien is injured. Presumably, Stevie Ireland is too?

if he is then he did well to make the squad!

Apologies didn't realise he was there.

[lyonsee]

briantinnion said:

Look to have fcuk all centre back cover.

Hoping McShane goes out on loan to a decent Championship side. I'd imagine he won't get a run with United this season.

[briantinnion]

Should have had Paddy McCarthy in it, he's Leicester City captain now, although that's not much of an accoloade considering the start they've had.

Looks as though the dream is over for Lee Trundle now anyway!

[briantinnion]

Just been reading in the Independent that Stan left out McCarthy because he doesn't think he's ready for international football. A bit strange as McCarthy is a 23 year old captaining a Championship side and Terry Dixon who has just made his reserve team debut is considered ready for intrernational football!

[bandage]

Was reading the papers on line there and saw an article by my old pal Gerry McDermott (he never did reply to the tirade I made against him back in the forum’s early days) about Paddy McCarthy. A few quotes from Staunton were there too – Paddy’s been booked over 20 times in 70 odd first team games and has 5 or 6 red cards too. Staunton says he needs to clean up his act discipline wise especially for international games with simulation and all that and that he can’t risk playing him yet until he cuts these rash challenges out of his game. Says he’ll watch him closely for Leicester though. Fair enough imo.

Surprised he didn’t call up another centre back though. That said (my new favourite phrase) I don’t think we should all class McShane as the saviour just because of his club. That mistake was made with O’Shea and McShane was pretty average last season when on loan at Brighton by all accounts.

Surprised also about Alan O’Brien. There’s lots of other Irish players playing first team football, e.g. the Sunderland contingent, and he calls up a guy that’s barely played 1st team football. Still giving him the benefit of the doubt though and going to go to the game in the hope he gives McGeady 90 minutes.

[therock67]

Still trying to get Kevin Nolan on board. We seem to be trying to get rid of all the red tape so I assume that means we've been given some indication by him that he'd play for us if the situation was resolved. I know many on here were saying they wouldn't like him to be picked - I'm not so sure. In an ideal world I'd tell him to fuck off but we're very light on central midfielders and he is a quality player.

[bandage]

Anyone hear about therock’s website publicity stunt going horribly wrong outside the Irish team hotel last night? Seems you can log on in prison now too as I see his name there at the bottom of the screen. Thank goodness the gaffer is alright.

[therock67]

I actually nearly had a cracking celebrity spot last night as I was down the seafront just after the alleged incident. My mother was in the hotel when it happened and saw it all. Beach was crawling yesterday evening with young folk out looking for the gun. Cracking stuff.

[steamboatsam]

i hear it was just an imitation gun so it was probably one of those toy ones that shot out a little flag with "thefreekick.com" printed on it

[briantinnion]

Duff has just withdrawn from the squad now. Seriously weakened side for wednesday night now, we'll be lucky to avoid a drubbing.

[bandage]

Joke:

What's all this about Stan Staunton being confronted by a gunman? I know he's new to international management and still getting to know his players, but surely he must have recognised Robbie Keane's goal celebration by now?

[briantinnion]

Good read here if anyone is interested:

football.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/0,,1851437,00.html

[therock67]

Any chance of a copy and paste BT? I can't get to that sport section in work.

[briantinnion]

Seems like a far more grounded fella than big time charlie Robbie anyway.



Bargain buy set to hit the heights

As the sensation of last season's Championship, cut-price Reading striker Kevin Doyle has been tipped by many to take this season's Premiership by storm. As he explains to Paul Doyle, everything's going to his patient plan


At the age of 17, Roy Keane had failed to secure a contract with an English club and feared he would be forever stuck playing amateur football in Ireland. He soon got his invitation across the water, of course, but years later he revealed that the fright of nearly missing out is what fuelled his famously ferocious drive to succeed. Reading striker Kevin Doyle remained in Ireland until the ripe old age of 21 - but unlike Keane, he's not in the least bit angry. Though like Keane, he could take the Premiership by storm.

Signed by Reading from Cork City in June 2005 for just £78,000, Doyle was the undisputed bargain of last season's Championship. His 18 league goals and all-round slickness were key to Reading's runaway title triumph and enabled him to achieve the rare feat of winning two domestic titles in a single season (the League of Ireland season runs from March to November and he had played enough matches for Cork before his transfer to entitle him to a medal when they went on to win the league). His impact in England was such that fans united in asking one obvious question: how come it took so long for anyone to spot him?

"I just didn't want to come over to England," Doyle explains straightforwardly. "A few clubs offered me trials when I was 16 but I knew I'd get terribly homesick if I left Ireland." Instead of flying the coup, then, Doyle availed of an option that players of Keane's generation never had - to make a living from football in his own country. "I decided to finish school in Wexford and then, when I was 17 I signed for St Patrick's Athletic up in Dublin," he explains. Suggest he had a wise, unusually patient head on young shoulders and he modestly deflects the praise elsewhere. "In fairness, I got good advice," he says. "[Then-St Patrick's manager] Pat Dolan and my underage manager at Wexford, Mick Wallace, told me that if I was good enough to make it in England, then I would do so eventually no matter where I started. They said I might as well play where I knew I'd be happy. That's what I did: I trained and played every day and was getting paid for it. It was great."

After two seasons with St Patrick's, Doyle headed back down south to Cork City, where his goals and sharpness made him a fans' favourite and earned him a call-up for the Irish Under-21s. Royals boss Steve Coppell was already watching him, possibly having been tipped off by Pat Dolan's brother Eamon, who heads Reading's academy. But even after seeing Doyle score against European opposition in Cork's Uefa Cup campaign and at international level for Ireland U21s, Coppell was uncertain this busy striker was worth even the meagre outlay he ended up paying. Indeed, he has since admitted: "We really weren't sure about him, we scouted him endlessly; he's probably the most scouted player in the club's history!"

Coppell's hesitancy perhaps stemmed from the fact that Doyle is difficult to define: far from being a poacher, he roams wide and deep, starting almost as many moves as he concludes. The player himself always fancied his chances of making it in a bigger league when he felt like it, which is why he had a clause inserted in his contract allowing him to leave Cork for next to nothing if the right club came in. That clause was soon to become infamous in Ireland. "It wasn't good business from our point of view, it's not a very professional addition to any contract," regrets Cork manager Damien Richardson, who had no part in devising the contract and was aghast to lose "a very, very special player" for so little. In the course of three fine seasons in his homeland, Doyle developed as a player and a person to the point that, when Reading eventually made their offer, he felt it was time to embark on his overseas adventure. "I knew I wasn't going to be first choice at Reading and there was still a chance that I'd wind up back at home a few years down the line completely forgotten about," he admits. "But I finally felt ready to take the gamble."

Although prepared for a long stint moulding the Madejski bench into the shape of his arse, Doyle actually got a chance to impress in Reading's first game of last season due to an injury to the previous season's top scorer Dave Kitson. The Royals collapsed to a home defeat by Plymouth and Doyle, with Kitson fit the following week, was quickly ditched. Four weeks later against Burnley, Kitson was injured again and this time, fortified by a couple of decent substitute appearances, Doyle headed a winner and generally seized his chance with such style that Coppell wouldn't leave him out of the starting line-up again. "He's given us the mobility we'd been lacking," gushed the manager. "He's so strong and can go right across the field putting defenders under pressure. He's come from nowhere but looks a real player."

Doyle, however, is quick to object to the claim he came from nowhere. "It's true the Championship was a step up but contrary to what a lot of people imagine there isn't the massive gulf between it and the League of Ireland," he says. "And playing with Cork, particularly in the European games, meant I wasn't in awe of the stadiums and crowds and things like that." That's not to say Doyle is spurred by exuberant I-was-born-for-this-day Ian Wright-style hubris. In fact, he admits: "Once I got into the team, I kept scoring but no, I certainly didn't expect it to go so well. But you can always dream!"

Last March, Doyle's living dream got even wilder as Steve Staunton gave him his first senior international cap in a 3-0 friendly triumph over Sweden. "It was mad really," he reflects. "I was in the Ireland team long before I expected to be even in the Reading team."

He's likely to be in the Reading team for many years yet, as the club swiftly offered him an improved contract to tie him to the Madejski until at least 2009. One of the main reasons he was so happy to sign is that in Coppell he has found a mentor who shares his straightforward, even-tempered personality. "There are managers who shout at you and there are others who just say things calmly and he's one of the latter," says Doyle approvingly. "He's the same day in and day out. I remember the first game of last season when we got beaten by Plymouth, his reaction after the game was the same as later on when we were winning nearly every match. He doesn't panic and he doesn't get carried away.

"One of the great things about him is that he doesn't try to muddle things up by giving loads of different instructions. He's given me a few basic tips but nothing especially complicated. In terms of my own game, I think I'm reasonably good at most things but am eager to get better at everything - continual progress is my aim and under him I've managed to achieve that so far. As for the team, everyone respects him for the way he encourages us to play simple, flowing football. "

But at the dawn of a new Premiership season in which mere survival is the imperative, will the manager be attempted to abandon his noble commitment to fluent football in order to pack the midfield and scrounge points? "I'd like to think that because we did so well with our 4-4-2 system last season, he'll give it a good go this season," says Doyle. "I certainly prefer that to 4-5-1 because as a lone striker you have an awful lot of work to do and don't get many chances on goal."

The Premiership doesn't just pose challenges on the pitch, of course. There are also off-pitch temptations. Doyle doesn't seem the type to go chasing Page 3 stunnahs or stagger from bar to bar bellowing 'don't you know who I am?' but as a 23-year-old international Premiership striker, does he ever feel like letting rip and revelling in his fame? "Sure, when I go into Reading town centre it's rare that even one person recognises me so I'm not likely to go swanning around London with a big head!" he scoffs. So how does he spend his spare time, apart from playing hurling, which is what he and Irish team-mates Shane Long and Stephen Hunt were doing at Reading's training ground just after this interview. "Well, I'm spending a crazy amount of time trying to get match tickets for half of Wexford," he laughs. "As soon as we got promoted it seemed like everyone back home wanted to go to our game at Old Trafford!"

Home: it's a word that crops us quite frequently during the conversation. Is there any danger of him succumbing to the home-sickness he feared when he was younger? "Not at all," he chirps. "I'm hardly ever alone anyway, there's always someone over for the weekend. They're mostly friends I made when I was between 17 and 21, people I'd never have met if I'd come to England when I first had the chance. There's no doubt I was right to wait." And there's no doubt Reading fans reckon this level-headed, fleet-footed striker was worth waiting for, too.

[bandage]

Anyone going to the game tonight then give me a pm. Have decided that a major session is in order and it’s just a bonus that it’s LC results night too (had wondered why steamboatsam decided he wanted to go to this game in particular). I don’t believe the team has been announced yet. I would go for the following in a 433/451 formation:

Kenny

Carr, O’Brien, O’Shea, Finnan

Reid, Kavanagh, Miller

McGeady Elliot

Doyle



Come on the Ireland!

[bandage]

So the Ireland game then. Must admit to having worries about our manager after that shambles. Fair enough the squad was decimated by injury but no matter what team you put out they should be organised and know the system they’re supposed to be playing. It appeared last night that a lot of the players didn’t know their job at all. From my vantage point it seemed we were playing 433 with Kilbane, Morrison and Elliot as the front 3. This obviously didn’t suit Kilbane at all but it also meant the midfield 3 was Reid, Kavanagh and McGeady. They got a good bit of joy down our right with Aiden unsure as to whether to tuck in and help the midfield, who were getting the runaround, or come out wide to help Carr.

They played through us in the first half, don’t think it’d be an exaggeration to say they had about 75% of the possession. Only after half time did we show any decent signs. Thought (Wexford’s) Kevin Doyle was excellent in everything he did and McGeady was good on the right. Even Liam Miller got them passing a bit. It shows how threadbare our squad is now though, we have no cover for centre back or left back and the centre of midfield is extremely weak. Last night concluded that it’d be best to play one up front against Germany and pack midfield but don’t think Ireland have the players to keep the ball in midfield so that formation would only see us defending for 90 minutes. Would try to play a similar attacking game as away to France (how I miss Brian Kerr) with Doyle and Keane up front but I’m fooked if I know who to play in midfield.