FAI draw hope from prospective German bailout

INTERNATIONAL SOCCER:DESPITE THE ongoing boom down that way, shares in Irish bars around Rio most likely dipped slightly over the weekend as Saturday's World Cup draw appeared to plunge Giovanni Trapattoni's side into a head-to-head battle with Sweden to finish as runners-up to Germany in qualification Group C.

There was some upbeat talk from Trapattoni and John Delaney over the weekend regarding Ireland’s chances of actually challenging for top spot but history suggests it is a long shot. The Germans have been at every finals tournament since 1954.

They’ve won three of the 15 they’ve participated in during that time, finished second twice and third three times, and they only missed out on the tournament’s last visit to Brazil four years earlier due to the sporting ostracisation that followed the second World War rather than any shortcomings on the part of their national team.

Still, there is an upside to being drawn against Europe’s wealthiest nation, with Delaney estimating the German game should deliver an additional profit of around €6 million.

“The very first thing always with a group is to see if you can qualify,” he said, “and then after that you look at the financial consequences. In terms of qualifying, in terms of Sweden, Austria, the Faroes and Kazakhstan, none of those teams we need fear. So that’s a plus.

“And traditionally we’ve always done well against Germany. Under Steve Staunton, we only lost 1-0 over the two games. From a financial perspective, there’s roughly about €6 million of an incremental above our current contracts out of this group, which is good.”

In fact, Ireland finished 10 points adrift of the Germans in the Euro 2008 campaign but the profit on that occasion was around €10 million as the home game was a sell-out at the larger Croke Park and they were slightly better times for TV rights.

Delaney wasn’t complaining about the drop, though, as the new figure still amounts to around 10 per cent of the association’s current debt and he suggested there would be an additional bonus from a pre-existing contract as a result of being drawn against Sweden.

Another positive on the financial front was avoiding the English which means that a friendly the association hopes to stage against them in Dublin either late this year or in mid 2012 can still go ahead.

Trapattoni, meanwhile, only conceded a little reluctantly that Joachim Loew’s side would start the campaign as favourites to take top spot.

“In theory, yes (they will be the team to beat) but there are so many factors in international football these days – things like fitness and injuries can all have a big impact. But just looking coldly at the number of players they can call up, and the quality of those players, then theoretically yes, you’d have to rate them as one of the potential finalists.”

He admitted that Brian Kerr’s involvement with the Faroese will add an extra ingredient to Ireland’s games against them but denied that the trip to Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, would pose any particular problem.

“Brian Kerr certainly knows the Irish players and that will be a stimulus for them. But we believe very much in what we do and how we are organised and the Irish team has changed quite a lot since that time as well. But yes, the game will have a different dynamic.

As for Astana: “The only thing you might have to do, if you’re travelling out that far, is take an extra day into account. But we have had the experience of travelling a long way east to Armenia, so I don’t think this will have a major effect.”

Kerr, meanwhile, seemed pleased at the prospect of taking on Ireland. “I had a bit of a feeling, a little hunch that it might break this way,” he said. “It’s a long way down the road, though, and who knows, international football is a volatile enough business. People are a little preoccupied with the current campaign but at the moment I think it’s recognised that we’re doing reasonably well and I hope we’re still there when these games get under way.”

The Germans were, he said, clearly one of the teams to avoid while the Swedes, he suggested would be difficult for Ireland.

“At the moment you wouldn’t want to be playing them (Germany). They’ve played seven games in the current group and won all seven. I think the only one that would have been worse would have been Spain. And Sweden tend to be an effective enough unit.

“They’re currently second in their group and while they’ve few enough superstars, they’ll be sticky enough opponents when these qualifiers come around.”

Delaney, meanwhile, suggested that a meeting to organise the schedule of fixtures will take place towards the end of this month in Frankfurt. It is not clear whether Trapattoni, who is waiting to see if he will still be manager of the team for the next campaign, will attend.

“We’re very pleased with Giovanni but that’s for another day. These games won’t commence for another 15 months or so. The Euros are much more relevant now. We have two big games in September and they’re the immediate matter that concerns everybody.”

First up, of course, is the friendly game against Croatia next week. John O’Shea is a doubt for that game with a hamstring injury he picked up while away with Sunderland, but will come to Dublin to test it out ahead of the game and should be available for next month’s more important games against Slovakia and Russia.