Fenlon relieved to find common ground with new regime

UNDER-23 INTERNATIONAL CHALLENGE TROPHY:WITH GIOVANNI Trapattoni set to be unveiled to the Irish public at large today, the Ireland Under-23 manager Pat Fenlon expressed his delight following a private meeting with the incoming management team yesterday morning prior to the announcement of his League of Ireland-based squad for Tuesday week's visit to play Northern Ireland in the International Challenge Trophy.

Fenlon had been unhappy no contact had been made with him and not one League of Ireland player made a 40-man senior squad named last month ahead of the upcoming training camp in Portugal and friendlies with Serbia and Colombia.

"I had a meeting (yesterday) morning with the three members of the senior international management team and it was a very, very good meeting," said Fenlon.

"We spoke about the squad and what it was about, the players that were in it. There will be someone at our game - at this moment I'm not sure who - but I'm delighted with that. They've shown a big interest in what we're trying to do.

"It's something we've always spoken about. We're all going in the one direction in football and we want to make sure that everybody is behind it . . . it's important that the people running the senior international team are behind what we're trying to do as well."

Trapattoni having apparently done some homework on the League of Ireland and this tournament also impressed Fenlon.

"He showed an interest, before I even spoke, in relation to what he knew about it, how the league is run and that sort of thing . . . He knew a bit in relation to the other group, with Italy being in it, so he obviously had a little bit of a handle on what was going on in relation to this tournament.

"So, from our meeting - and I spoke to Liam (Brady) as well - they seem to be fairly keen that they wanted to involve people from our league in the whole set-up."

Bohemians manager Fenlon has made four, mostly enforced, changes to the squad that beat Slovakia 2-0 in their only game to date, last November.

St Patrick's Athletic goalkeeper Brendan Clarke, along with team-mate Joe O'Cearuill, Cobh Ramblers defender Shane Guthrie and Derry City midfielder Ruaidhri Higgins replace Darren Quigley, Seán Kelly, Kevin Deery and Stephen Bradley.

"Kevin Deery is injured; Darren Quigley is injured at Derry as well; Stephen Bradley is gone out of the league," explained Fenlon. "The players did well the last time . . . so we didn't feel we had to change too many things."

Dundalk manager John Gill has replaced Pete Mahon on Fenlon's staff for this game with ex-Galway United manager Tony Cousins in mind for the final group game, against Belgium in November.

REPUBLIC OF IRELAND UNDER-23 SQUAD:Murphy (Shamrock Rovers), Clarke (St Patrick's Ath), Kenna (UCD), O'Brien (Shamrock Rovers), O'Cearuill (St Patrick's Ath), Peers (Sligo Rovers), Powell (Bohemians), Guthrie (Cobh Ramblers), Coleman (Sligo Rovers), Kelly (Bohemians), Brennan (Bohemians), Rice (Shamrock Rovers), Keegan (Drogheda Utd), O'Donnell (Bohemians), Higgins (Derry City ), Kavanagh (UCD), Behan (Cork City), Quigley (St Patrick's Ath), Mooney (Cork City), Rowe (Bray Wanderers).