GROUP EIGHT INTERVIEW WITH SHAY GIVEN: After over 13 years of minding the Irish net with distinction, the Donegalman tells Michael Walkerof the highs and lows, but with focus on the future
WE STARTED at the beginning. It seemed as good a place as any. The conversation was planned to centre on Shay Given’s Irish times, from his first cap against Russia on March 27th, 1996, to what will be his 96th in Sofia against Bulgaria this evening.
Thirteen years, two months and 10 days, it is a stretch, one that proved sufficiently intricate for Given to rewind his thoughts to Russia at Lansdowne Road and find his memory bank contained only dog-eared snapshots.
Paul McGrath’s presence in the dressingroom, Given’s family in the stands, the “horrific purple, multi-coloured design jersey”, Roy Keane’s red card and Russia’s 2-0 win. But then, as Given said: “That’s 13 years ago. I can’t remember 13 days ago.”
Fair enough. Given is six weeks past his 33rd birthday and has just endured the most momentous season of his club career at Newcastle United and Manchester City – “Certainly the season with most upheaval.” It’s just that an international debut is something we bystanders imagine would be recalled in minute-by-minute detail. Surely, for example, Given would be able to rattle off the Irish team from that night.
Right-back? “Gary Kelly?” Wrong.
“Denis Irwin?” Wrong.
“Eh, right-back?” There was a pause. It turned into a silence.
Okay, what about left-back? “Denis Irwin?” No. Despite naming him in two positions, Denis Irwin did not play on your international debut.
“How the (expletive deleted) am I supposed to (expletive deleted) remember a game 13 (expletive deleted) years ago?”
Try again.
“Listen, you’re supposed to be the boy with the brains, not me, I just try to keep the ball out of the back of the net, like.
“Roy Keane played, he got sent off. Stan must have played. Quinn? Did Houghton play? Townsend? Cascarino? Did Aldridge play?”
Thinking of these names, and those of Alan Kernaghan and Terry Phelan – the actual full backs against Russia – and realising where it placed him, Given rolled his eyes. “I’m old, aren’t I?”
Given’s charm has long been part of his appeal. But the eyes can also narrow now, and he has become harder down the years, then again 17 years in professional football does that. Yet deep down, when he said, “I still feel Donegal,” you know what he means. Given in the present reminds us of characters in the past. And he is not old, not old-old.
At 33 he could have another five years at the top – his City contract signed in January expires in 2013 – and with the haul in caps nearing 100, that means Given is set to become the most capped Ireland player in history.
Given is not someone to take out a trumpet and blow but, when talking of McGrath, Given accepted his longevity makes him part of Irish football heritage. Against Russia, McGrath was breaking Packie Bonner’s then 80-cap record. Bonner played with Mick Martin whose father is Con Martin and so it goes back.
“To play behind Paul McGrath, that was my Jim’ll Fix It moment,” Given said, delighted still. “Nobody will ever take that away. It was towards the end of his career, I suppose, but it was a great honour. If you ask someone now who their all-time favourite Irish player is, he’d probably be top of the list. So it was a privilege for me to be in the same team. Such a legend. Paul was quite quiet but he had that aura. Andy Townsend, Quinny, great craic to be around. Banter always flowing. And it does link you to another, older era.”
The impression has always been Given prefers the here and now and the next day. But the idea of being part of a longer tradition is also persuasive to someone of such experience. There was little sense of anything other than pleasure when he reminisced about the various squads and campaigns he has been part of.
“Some great memories, great camaraderie. People like Gary Kelly, just clean mad. The team spirit. People make a big thing of a ‘drink culture’ but it’s just us being together having a couple of drinks. Now we drink more protein shakes than beer. It’s the company. Good memories.”
THE FIRSTcap came in Mick McCarthy's first game as manager – "I was too enthralled that it was mine to notice," – and the goalkeeper was part of the effort to get to France in 1998 in McCarthy's first set of qualifiers. Perhaps surprisingly Given nominated the play-off loss to Belgium in Brussels in November '97 that ended that campaign as his deepest Irish disappointment.
“Luc Nilis,” he said with a grimace. “I was so young then that I thought the world had ended. That Saturday night in Brussels sticks out.”
Set against that was a play-off high. It came in Tehran four years later and led Ireland to the World Cup in South Korea and Japan. Both of the November 2001 games against Iran feature in Given’s top three internationals, the dramatic 1-0 win over Holland at Lansdowne Road two months earlier being the other.
“That day at Lansdowne Road, that was the best home atmosphere I played in. Then the two Iran games. We qualified for the World Cup. I think I made a big save in the home leg, in the second half down to my left, and then a few away. And we actually qualified. I felt I’d played my part.
“The atmosphere in Tehran was mental. It was the most hostile atmosphere I’ve ever been in. We went out to look at the pitch about an hour and a half before kick-off and the stadium was full. It had been for five hours. There were no females, all male, 100,000 of them. Maybe there were two FAI women.
“We came out to warm up and they were throwing these things like grenades at us. It was nuts, just lobbing things at us, oranges, bananas, then these things started exploding. I just shook, one landed a couple of yards away from me and made a hole in the ground. The dirt hit me in the face. It was a massive noise. They were like bangers. To come through that . . . some experience.
“Away nights, I love them. Even this year at Hamburg with City, 70,000 there. Rotterdam with Newcastle (in 2002).”
Tehran opened a path that led to Saipan, then Niigata, Ibaraki, Yokohama and finally heartbreak against Spain in Suwon.
“It was just disappointing the way it ended. We had two penalties in the game, one we missed, one we scored, we should really have bate Spain. Then we went to penalties and I didn’t save any, which was disappointing from a personal view. That was a sad end. But looking back now, the World Cup was the highlight of my career.”
And McCarthy? “I felt Mick was harshly treated. There was the Saipan thing, half the country taking his side, half not, but Mick always wanted to do what was best for the country. He is as honest as the day is long. People should not forget what a good job he did and in the end he was hounded out. Mick has proven again with Wolves what a good manager he is. Again he hasn’t spent a load of money. He’s a very good manager.”
Enter Brian Kerr, the second of Given’s four Ireland managers. With Kerr came the return of Roy Keane and for Given this is one of those moments that overlaps with the present. For Roy Keane then, read Stephen Ireland now.
“I didn’t have a problem with Roy coming back. You want the strongest team to be picked for Ireland and whether it was Roy then or Stephen Ireland today, if he was to come back I wouldn’t have a problem. People shouldn’t get caught up in politics, who’s right, who’s wrong. Forget about the baggage and get on with it.”
Since he moved to City, has he spoken to Ireland about Ireland? “I haven’t really had a deep conversation, sat him down. I’ve kind of tried to keep it jovial. I spoke to (Richard) Dunney about it and he has spoken to him a few times. But at the minute it’s not right for him. There’s no defining reason for it.
“What I can say is that since I’ve been at Manchester City he’s been fantastic and it’d be brilliant if he was here with us. He is brilliant, the best player at the club. When he played for Ireland I didn’t think he was that good and he would probably admit that himself. But last summer he went off and worked with a fitness guy and he worked hard. He’s been our player of the season and you can see why, he’s a class act.
“When they do the Pro-zone stats on his running, distance covered, high-intensity runs, he’s probably one of the top three in the Premier League. He is phenomenal and he’s added goals this season. Even in the 90th minute he’s dashing into the box. He could add a lot to this team. Hopefully one day he’ll come back. When he does, people should welcome him. He’s a young man. The door should never be closed. But it’s got to come from him himself.”
STEPHEN IRELAND'Spresence in Sofia tonight would up Irish confidence. Given knows the scale of the game but he said two other City players know it too: Valeri Bojinov and Martin Petrov. "They've been talking about this game since I got there. It's massive for Bulgaria. It's the same for us. But they are really getting going for this game. Along with Italy away, this'll be the toughest game in the group."
April’s result in Bari means thoughts of South Africa linger. After the FAI’s Steve Staunton experiment, Giovanni Trapattoni has just had his first anniversary in the job. “For us to have him is fantastic,” Given said shortly before Trapattoni walked past. “He’s very enthusiastic, bubbly, but you don’t become a manager without knowing football, being technically and tactically aware. And I think he’s ruthless.
“He’s jovial and nice but as a manager he’s ruthless. You need to be. He’s been doing this for nearly 50 years and if he knows there’s a decision to be made, he’ll make it. He’s fiery.”
Do the two of you talk at length? “His English wouldn’t be as good as mine – like. But he’s getting better. He’d be a proud Irishman if we qualify for the World Cup.”
As would Given. The years away have not eroded his hometown emotion. He will be back soon. “I still feel Donegal and I’m looking forward to going home in a few weeks, seeing family and so on. It’s just nice to go back, across the bridge into Lifford, you still get excited by that. Just to go for a quiet pint in Bannigans, listen to the banter, the bog chatter, the slang, all about the people in Lifford and around the area. No one else would get it but the lads are bent over laughing. Bog chatter.
“I still go back to the house, the same one. I still sleep in the same bed, the smallest in the house. It’s still my bedroom, my dad and my stepmum are there. The rest are all out and about. I’ve got two sisters in Dublin and a brother doing a FAS course there. Then I’ve a brother and sister in Belfast, one in Newcastle, one in Germany, they’re all spread out.”
Given’s respect for his father Séamus and stepmother Margaret shone through his words. Part of the reason Given is cherished on Tyneside is the cancer charity work he threw himself into while there. As a child he lost his mother Agnes.
“It was tough, anyone who’s lost a parent will know. When you get older you can make more sense of it, but I was five. My son’s 4 and a half now and I look at him and think I was a similar size, you think it’s such a horrible thing to happen. But my Da was strong and he kept us together, my stepmum Margaret came along a few years later and she helped. All my brothers and sisters helped.
“I do believe she’s somewhere looking down and I do believe even when I’m playing football she’s looking down. The charity work we’ve done is close to me. When I left Newcastle I got letters from people saying the charity helped them. It makes you want to do more. But no one can bring your Mum back. I’d just love to speak to her, see what she thinks. It’s not going to happen, is it?”
JUNE 6TH.It makes for a long season and a World Cup next summer means the next one will be condensed. For the first time in 12 years it will begin with Given not in Newcastle United colours. He was part of the eruption at St James' Park this season – "just one debacle after the next" – and a fortnight ago it brought the meltdown of relegation. Given's tone on Newcastle was a combination of despair and love. He hopes Manchester City have observed and learned.
“It was a wrench to leave. I’d been there nearly 12 years. I’ve a lot of friends and family up there, a lot of reasons to stay put. But it fizzled out in the last couple of years. It’s such a great club, the stadium, the fans, just such a shame for the people, real working-class people in Newcastle. A lot of lives revolve around their football club.
“I felt Kevin Keegan was the right man. But players came in that we didn’t need, or even want. You know what I mean? That undermines everything and the manger, rightly so, had to stand up and say the squad wasn’t good enough. He has been proven right.
"AFTER KEEGANleft we had no manager, then we had Joe Kinnear, who hadn't been a manager for four years. The club was up for sale then it wasn't up for sale. One thing after another. At a Premiership club? People can say players get paid for playing football, and they do, but what goes on behind the scenes matters. I felt it was the right time to leave. Maybe it's a selfish point of view, but I felt I deserved better.
“Alan (Shearer) is the right man to get them back. They just left it too late to bring him in. He knows the club and he’s a Geordie but more than that, he’s clever.
“They have to look at the bigger picture at Newcastle now. It’s been going on too long, a manager here, a manager there, nine managers in the past three years or something like that. Look at Ferguson, Wenger, even Benitez now. At Man City I hope Mark Hughes will be there for a good number of years. Change can do more harm than good.”
A man of continuous and ongoing service, it was no surprise to hear Given say that. Yet at City he is now part of a changing club with the sort of finance to change Manchester, England and Europe. He has changed his geography too. But what does not change with Shay Given is the desire to play. At heart he remains the 19-year-old staring with awe at Paul McGrath.
“I’d love to make 100,” he said of Ireland caps. “I don’t know how long I’ll go on but I still feel young and fit and strong. I’m not contemplating retiring.”
