Things that might have been

TREVOR MOLLOY and David Connolly were viewing their careers from vastly different perspectives yesterday, as the Republic of Ireland got ready to meet Ghana at the end of their programme in the World Youth Championship here in Malaysia.

The game, in Kuala Lumpur's Shah Alam stadium, is to decide third and fourth places in the championship, a puny prize when compared to that awaiting either Argentina or Uruguay in the final in the same arena later in the day.

For Molloy, the lad from Dublin's Sheriff Street who was reborn with Athlone Town after being shown the gate by Shamrock Rovers earlier in the season, life in the tropics has not been without its rewards.

Promoted to a regular place in the front line by manager Brian Kerr, he responded by hitting three goals and producing sufficient skill in the torrid heat to convince St Patrick's Athletic that he could help their cause significantly next season.

Pat Dolan, St Patrick's manager, who travelled to Kuching in midweek to complete the deal, declined to discuss the financial details, but when the small print is clarified, the player's weekly wage is unlikely to amount to much more than Pounds 120.

Compare that with the Pounds 12,000 a week which Connolly will earn with Dutch club Feyenoord after turning his back on English football on the completion of his contract with Watford.

And Connolly, of course, pulled out of the under-20 championship when, in common with another senior international, Ian Harte, he was advised by Mick McCarthy that it would be more beneficial to take a summer break before the restart of the World Cup programme against Lithuania next month.

Few in the FAI, it has to be said, demurred at that decision. After all, the revenue from World Cup games fuels the economy of Irish football and in any case, the level of expectation for the under-20 team was not particularly high. After all, they had struggled to make the cut in the qualifying series last season, losing to England and only scraping in when Russia, depleted by three sendings-off, were beaten 3-0 by Spain in their last game.

At that point, too, neither McCarthy nor the FAI was to know that four more established players, Richard Dunne (Everton), Alan Mahon (Tranmere), Kevin Kilbane (Preston) and Ross Darcy (Tottenham) would be lost to the squad through injury.

In one of the more reassuring stories of the sporting year so far, however, the heavily-depleted squad triumphed and as one impressive performance superseded another, the loss of more than half of Kerr's probable team was seen in true perspective.

Ireland, for all the running repairs needed along the way, were not a million miles from winning a championship which, in terms of prestige, rates second only to the World Cup on FIFA's list of promotions.

And suddenly, that decision by McCarthy in May and the "injuries" which caused clubs to withdraw other players are being judged in a different light.

Would the defensive skills of Dunne, the varied midfield qualities of Harte and Mahon and, not least, the scoring power of Connolly, have made the difference between an enormously brave, but unsuccessful challenge and the supreme fulfilment of winning the trophy.

Kerr, who assumed responsibility for the squad only after they had qualified for the finals, has no doubts. "It's a very line between success and failure when you get to the knock-out stages and yes, I think we could have won the championship with the inclusion of an additional two or three quality players.

"That is not to demean the contribution of those who took their places and who, by the standards they set out here, brought a lot of pride and a lot of respect to the country.

"But compared to other countries who could select players with considerable experience at senior club level, our resources were pitiful. Damien Duff made one appearance in Blackburn's senior team last season, Neale Fenn was in the Tottenham team that played Manchester United in the FA Cup and towards the end of the season, Robbie Ryan had a couple of games for Huddersfield. After that, we were dependant on lads who spent their weekends playing reserve team football.

"More than that, the investment in the team was minimal. We got together for just a week in Limerick before coming out here and even then, half the lads couldn't train because of knocks. And to think we came so close to success -after all that."

Kerr added: "It's hypothetical now, but with more investment, a longer preparation and better co-operation from the FAI, Mick McCarthy and the managers of English clubs, I believe that we could have hit the jackpot here.

"The idea that we shouldn't send our best players to a championship we had a chance of winning - never having won anything in international football in the 75 years the FAI has been in existence - is, to me, ridiculous.

That, as Kerr and his assistants are quick to acknowledge, is down, in part, to selfishness, on the one hand, and a crass lack of judgement by football authorities here and in Britain on the other.

In a business increasingly influenced by the accountancy profession and the added pressures that entails, English clubs are reluctant to release players for international duty without direction from FlFA.

And compared to the importance which other European and South American countries attach to the under-20 championship, the level of commitment in this part of the world is, at times, derisory.

And yet, the tributes to the quality of Ireland's performances here are on-going. In its report of the semi-final, an Argentinian sports paper said that Ireland provided tougher opposition for Argentina than either Brazil or England in earlier matches.

And for the second day running, - capers in Kuala Lumpur wrote of the Irish team's luck in losing a game they might have won. Moreover, Brian Kerr appears to be winning his struggle with the publicity machine to convince the sceptics that his team does not play a British-style game.

"Every preview of our games that I've read since setting down here, contained the sentence 'it will be a battle of brain and brawl'. And each time, I've tried to confront the journalist with the question of which team has the brawn?

"It certainly can't be Ireland. Physically, ours is the smallest team here. But in terms of skill and commitment, I think we're up there with the biggest of them.

"To me, the football that Ireland teams played in the last 10 years was stone-age stuff. I'll admit that it was effective and brought us to a new level in the ratings. But anytime I went to international games at Lansdowne Road, it was, primarily, to watch thee opposing team and how they set about handling Ireland's style.

"The theory that because every other team is skilful and we're not skilful, therefore we must find other means of countering it, is no longer valid. We proved in Malaysia that Irish players are as skilful as the next. And when you marry that to the national attributes of character and cuteness in a football sense, I think we'll be on to a winning formula."

Bran Kerr, pragmatic by nature, visionary by the demands of his calling, had said his piece. And another of the day's dates with the media was through.