Depleted squad means low-key start to first run-out

INTERNATIONAL SOCCER:AS THE row over the FAI's line on autumn friendly fixtures rumbled on yesterday, the Irish training camp got off to a predictably low-key start in Malahide where barely more than half of the squad selected by Giovanni Trapattoni last month gathered for their first run out of the week.

In addition to Stephen Ward and David Meyler – who had already pulled out – Darron Gibson and Caleb Folan have fallen by the wayside due to injuries while James McCarthy and Marc Wilson were being assessed by their clubs yesterday.

Andy Keogh is temporarily unavailable due to the impending birth of his first child and Keith Treacy, who made a fleeting appearance at the team hotel yesterday, will not be back until at least Wednesday as he is recovering from a hernia operation.

On the brighter side, Derby County midfielder Paul Green was due to arrive last night on the ferry, (Keiren Westwood and Kevin Foley had both travelled over by boat too due to the uncertainty regarding flights) while Liam Lawrence is due in over the course of today and the Stoke City player should also be in a position to feature against Paul Doolin’s under-23 League of Ireland side tomorrow night. Paul McShane will captain the Irish selection for the first time.

“There are some players missing but it is not a problem,” insisted Marco Tardelli last night. “There are still many good players here and the training today went well. It is good that we get to see them and that they learn what we want to do. In four or five days we can learn a great deal about each other.”

Tardelli, who said he had been impressed by Shane Duffy, Greg Cunningham and Keith Fahey in training yesterday, said Trapattoni is still not certain that he will have either Shay Given or Stephen Hunt for the start of the European qualifying campaign and so Westwood is likely to be given as many opportunities as possible.

Limerick FC, meanwhile, were understood to be consulting again with their legal advisers before reacting to FAI chief executive John Delaney’s comments on RTÉ radio yesterday regarding the club’s proposed friendly with Barcelona. Asked by Marian Finucane whether the basis for the association’s stand regarding the game essentially came down to its own financial interest, Delaney confirmed that it did but he then went on to criticise the club, claiming that they had initially accepted the decision before deciding to go public on the matter.

“If you put a position and it’s accepted by the club,” he said, “and they say, that’s fine, and we’ll see you on Wednesday and you behave in the manner they’ve done, bringing the game into disrepute a bit the way they’ve behaved the last couple of days, around the time of the opening of the stadium, on Thursday night, issuing legal letters on Friday night. It was done in poor taste. Naive.

“I deal with clubs all the time, national associations and agents, I know the way it works. I think the guys in Limerick have been very naive in how they’ve dealt with this, and who they’re dealing with and I can only deal with the facts I have. A lot of spin, a lot of stuff which you may believe was put out in the public, I can only deal with the facts as I see them.”

When the association first wrote to the club last Tuesday, however, informing them the game could not go ahead, there had been no mention whatsoever of the third party commercial agreement that is now claimed to bind the organisation to refuse permission. At that stage, the club was informed that the match would clash with league fixtures, including some that might have to be rescheduled due to European games.

It was subsequently communicated to the club by Noel Mooney, the league’s head of marketing and promotion, that there were commercial difficulties too, with the association apparently claiming that a deal it has with a rival agent prohibits it from allowing any game to proceed that might attract a crowd of more than 20,000.

The association’s suggestion, meanwhile, that it might intervene with Uefa to secure a change of date for Bohemians if the club ended up being scheduled to play a Champions League tie in Dalymount Park on the same night as the association’s lucrative game against Manchester United, has been firmly rejected by the club’s manager, Pat Fenlon.

“It’s another decision that baffles everybody, but how and ever, they keep making them so let them at it. We won’t be moving any game. If we get through, we’ll be playing on the night we’re designated to play. It’s as simple as that.

“It’s a friendly match and that won’t take preference over a Champions League game for us. Hopefully we have that problem, that we get through, and then it becomes a bigger problem for other people.”