SOCCER: EURO 2012 QUALIFYINGRetirement is not on the captain's radar as he prepares for two crunch qualifiers, writes EMMET MALONE
WE SHOULD know a little more about how Robbie Keane is taking to life in LA after the Galaxy’s newest star, in his capacity of Republic of Ireland captain, answers questions at the pre-match press conference this afternoon. To judge by Richard Dunne’s attitude to his compatriot’s move, though, the initial feedback must be positive enough.
“Yeah. I think it would be nice to live the lifestyle out there,” said the Aston Villa defender when asked if he might fancy a similar move some day. “If the opportunity came at 34, 35, I’d definitely take it.”
This rather blew a hole in the theory that several journalists were harbouring before meeting the Dubliner that Dunne had expressed a desire to finish his career with Shamrock Rovers. “No, not unless they move to LA,” he said with a laugh.
Howver, he looked pretty serious as he weighed up whether Keane would continue to travel home for international games and, having observed that games here might represent a welcome excuse for the striker to visit his family, he added he might “just want to stay in LA all the time with the lifestyle over there. Who can blame him?”
Dunne, of course, has spent a good deal of his career in rather less glamorous spots than LA but his lifestyle has still managed to generate its fair share of controversy. Last year it seemed to contribute to a difficult relationship with then Villa manager Gerard Houllier and he acknowledges now that if the Frenchman had stayed then he probably wouldn’t have.
Instead, he finds himself a key part of the team again with both his form and confidence restored under Alex McLeish who provided the Irishman with reassurances about his future shortly after arriving at the club.
“I spoke to him during the summer when he took over,” he says. “He heard of stuff that happened at Villa last year, between myself and James Collins but he said that if we recaptured our form then he wanted me and James to be his main centre-halves.
“That gave us confidence right away. As soon as we got back training, he was working on things defensively, asking our opinion. When you play well, he’s high-fiving you and patting you on the back. If you make a mistake, he tells you as well.”
On the international front, meanwhile, he is driven by his unfulfilled ambition. He was a regular during the side’s last successful campaign but ended up sitting out every one of the games in Japan and South Korea. Now, he sees his international career very much in terms of what chance he has of realising his ambition to play in a major championship for his country.
“If we qualified then you might start thinking we’re going through a period where we might start qualifying for more tournaments,” he says when asked about his thinking regarding possible retirement at this level when the current campaign is over. “I wouldn’t want to miss out on that if I had the chance. We’ll just wait and see. Hopefully, I won’t have to make a decision until June or July.
“If we miss out, though, obviously you would kick yourself. It would be disappointing. I’d love to play in a major tournament for Ireland and this is probably my second last chance of trying to get there. I’d love to do it and come the summer it would definitely give the whole country a lift.”
The most direct route would be to win the two games against Slovakia and Russia and while he admits the game in Moscow will be challenging, he believes that the Irish left enough room for improvement last October to travel with some optimism.
“The main thing is to focus on Friday and make sure we get something there,” he says. “But we can’t just go to Russia and think we need to be lucky to get something. Last time we didn’t play well against them but I think that over the summer, since that game, the squad has gotten stronger.
“We have a bit more experience and the results since then have been great. We’ve a bit more confidence. We don’t go into games anymore looking for draws. From the outset we are looking to win and as the game pans out we’ll see how it is and make sure we don’t lose.
“Formations don’t make that much of a difference if everyone is pulling their weight and doing their jobs correctly,” he adds in relation to the suggestion that the Russians outwitted us last time around. “Whoever has the more determined players will win. It’s not formations, it’s about attitudes and once we go there we’ll feel like we have a score to settle.”
