Kelly aiming to kick-start a really big year

IT IS a little over nine years since Ireland beat South Africa 2-1 in front of 45,000 people in New Jersey and, with most of Ireland’s senior players having returned to their clubs for one reason or another, there will be no Irish survivors from that night on show in front of perhaps a quarter as many people at Thomond Park this evening.

Robbie Keane, Shay Given and Kevin Kilbane all featured in the 2000 encounter but Giovanni Trapattoni was determined yesterday to paint their collective absence as an opportunity for less established squad members to show him what they can do.

For Stephen Kelly, one of those told yesterday he will get the chance to impress, the Giants Stadium game coincided with a major period of upheaval with the then 16 year-old moving that summer from his home in Dublin and schoolboy football with Belvedere Boys to London and the start of his career in the professional game with Tottenham Hotspur.

Now newly arrived at Fulham and some four years a member of the Ireland squad, he is hoping tonight’s game marks the start of another momentous period in his career.

“I want to cement my place in the Fulham team,” he says, “hopefully finish as high up the table as we did last season and qualify for the World Cup. Not much at all!” he says with a laugh.

“These are all things that are well within my grasp, though, it’s not like I’m shooting for the stars; these are things that are definitely achievable for all of us here and for me in particular, it’s something I am more than capable of doing. I’ve proved it in the past and I definitely think I can do it again.”

Clearly Kelly, who turned 26 on Sunday, has some work to do but as he chats easily about his career over the past few seasons, there is certainly the sense that he is not afraid of the effort he knows will be required.

To date, he has featured in just five competitive games at international level, two of them under Trapattoni, but the season before last he was the only outfield player in the English top flight to feature in every minute of every game. Last season didn’t go nearly so well for a number of reasons, not least injury, but he is fit again and confident of the impact he can make with Fulham – once the matter of establishing himself in Roy Hodgson’s first team is dealt with.

“You’re never happy when you’re not playing but you have got to look at the bigger picture,” he says. “It’s only early on in the season and you kind of think: ‘Well, the way things finished last year you can understand why the manager would stick with the same team’.

“Pre-season went really well for me, though. I played well in all of the games and in the couple of games in Europe I’ve played so far I’ve felt like I’ve acquitted myself well so hopefully, it won’t be long before I get the chance to cement my place there.”

A breakthrough in west London, he believes, could pave the way for more sustained progress at international level and the 90 minutes he played against Georgia in February, combined with the appearance late on in Bulgaria, certainly appears to provide the basis for believing he is not too far from the manager’s thoughts on the big occasions.

“Club football obviously comes first. If you’re playing for your club, you’ve a great chance of playing internationally. That’s what I need to do.”

A strong performance tonight just might accelerate his progress on both fronts and, of course, kick-start what the full back hopes will be a very big year.