McCarthy insists team still on course

Mick Mc Carthy was yesterday promising positive results but little artistic merit as he looked ahead to the game in Macedonia on October 10th which is likely to determine if the Republic of Ireland go to the European championship finals next summer.

To arrive there as automatic qualifiers from Group Eight, Ireland must repeat an earlier success in the championship over the Macedonians and then depend on Croatia preventing a Yugoslav win when they meet in Zagreb on the same day, at the same time.

That is the scenario which has been in prospect for some time and before breaking camp in the early hours of the morning, at the end of their punishing three games in eight days programme, McCarthy was at pains to reassure the faithful.

"It won't be very pretty but we're going to win in Macedonia" he said. And given the circumstances surrounding the game, I don't believe that Yugoslavia will take three points from their visit to Croatia."

That bold prediction is scarcely sustained by the permutation of results in Wednesday's programme in which Yugolsavia's buoyant football in Skopje, contrasted sharply with the bankruptcy of Ireland's second half performance against Malta.

Yet, McCarthy, in hawkish mood, was stubborn in his refusal to listen to the prophets of doom. "We've largely achieved what we set out to do, although with the exception of the game against Yugoslavia, I'm sure we didn't win too may points for artistic merit. But we're still on track, we're almost there and that's all that matters.

"If we win and play crap, people will always complain. But it honestly doesn't bother me. Manchester United didn't play well in the Champions League final last season but they still won it. Their name is on the trophy and that's all that matters.

"It is better to play badly and win than play well and lose. One of the worst feelings in football, is to go home, knowing that you've been mugged."

McCarthy added: "When you think that we were only 90 seconds away from a result in Croatia which would have given us seven points from the three games, you have to be happy with our work over the last eight days.

"For 93 minutes in Croatia, I was being hailed as some kind of tactical genius. A minute later, I was a bit of a b... because of the way we had played. But that's football for you".

On an evening of some astonishing results around Europe, the Ireland manager can point to his team's placing in Group Eight as the convincing evidence that he called most of the shots right.

Alone of the teams from these islands, he is in a position to go to the finals as group winners. And given the fact that he's rebuilt his squad almost totally in the last three years, that is an achievement of undeniable merit.

There are occasions when he risks erring on the side of loyalty but in the main, his team selections have been perceptive and tactically alert. And this in spite of the criticism he shipped for the team he sent into action in Zagreb last Saturday evening.

In particular, he can take a lot of satisfaction from his decision to include younger players like Steve Carr, Mark Kennedy and Kevin Kilbane in his starting line up. And the on going success of Robbie Keane is, perhaps, the most gratifying bonus of all.

True, the Coventry City player tended to drift out of the game after the opening quarter but it was his early goal which lit the road to success, even if survival came down in the end to some fine goalkeeping by Alan Kelly and a couple of agonising misses for the Maltese.

If one name tended to surface more than any other in the critical post match analyses, it was Steve Staunton, a man whose consistency quickly developed into one of Ireland's biggest assets in the 1990s.

For much of the decade, his was a name which appeared almost by right, in the list of credits until he stumbled on a raucous night in Belgrade last October when he was made to carry much of the blame for the goal which gave Yugoslavia victory.

Since then, his performances at left back have come under increasing scrutiny and in each of the last three games, he has been pilloried for isolated errors which in other times, might have gone unnoticed.

Whether these are the product of his recent tribulations at Liverpool or, perhaps, a blurred job specification handed down by the manager, is unclear but in spite of his heroics in Malta, the criticism has not gone away.

The player feels hard done by, in sections of the media, arguing that the criticism doesn't square with his record of achievement for Ireland. And support is readily forthcoming from McCarthy.

"There has never been any doubt in my mind about Steve. He has 80-odd caps to his credit and one bad game in Yugoslavia, should not be allowed to minimise his contribution to the team.

"I questioned him in private and asked if he wanted to go on playing international football and I guess he answered me with his performances over the last eight days. He is still a first class player and he proved how fit he was, by finishing as the freshest of the lads who played in all three games. That is some tribute to a 31-year-old."