O'Neill's hard graft pays off with well-deserved draw in Porto

SOCCER ANGLES:That Giovanni Trapattoni has got away with what he has says something about the FAI, writes MICHAEL WALKER

THERE IS, at least, one Irish international manager who has had a good week, and Michael O’Neill is Irish.

That detail seems to be important to some where Giovanni Trapattoni is concerned, though it is a minor one of the gripes that have left the Italian encircled by a collective Irish irritation.

Were Trap’s Ireland to be progressing, his nationality and idiosyncratic interpretation of the language would have ceased to be questioned. But progress has stalled and Trapattoni’s long-curious methodology is again the bullseye for critics. They are an ever-growing band.

Their fundamental concern is the same as before, mainly Trapattoni’s failure – an apparently wilful dereliction – to turn up regularly to games in Britain to watch his Irish players and those who could be his Irish players. If that is not in his job description, then he was given the wrong description.

In the beginning people were perplexed by this, but Trapattoni’s managerial record provided him with protection. He knows his stuff – or he knew his stuff. His early Irish record was okay and he was Giovanni Trapattoni.

So his non-presence, like his use of language, became a joke, something to laugh off. But it’s not funny, in its own way it is an insult to Irish football and Irish footballers. The idea that he could, or would choose to, behave in this way had he been appointed manager of Italy (again) or England or, say, Switzerland, is far-fetched. Trapattoni would simply not have done this, or if he had tried to, he would have been pulled up sharply.

That he has got away with it says something about the FAI. And that something is not flattering.

Because no matter what match a serious manager goes to, he will leave it smarter. For an international manager, in particular, the accumulation of detail is the nature of his working week, or it should be. We have heard at length from international managers about their day-to-day frustrations of not having players to work with, a pitch to go to.

So what do they do? They watch games. Or they should. They watch opponents. Or they should. And to watch Irish players the Irish manager needs to be based in Ireland or Britain, where 99 per cent of them operate professionally.

Another benefit of this is that the manager would be, and be seen to be, part of the culture.

Michael O’Neill will be a privileged man if he gets to manage just one of the great clubs Trapattoni has been at – AC and Inter Milan, Juventus, Bayern Munich, Benfica – and one imagines that O’Neill would hot-foot it from comparisons with Trapattoni. Rightly so, one is 43, the other is 73.

But O’Neill is also an Irish manager, one who has just guided Northern Ireland, hit by injuries and suspensions, to a 1-1 draw against the team ranked third in the world by Fifa, Portugal.

Given that the previous qualifier was also a 1-1 draw, at home to Luxemburg, it is not a moment to go over the top.

But in both games, there was an absence of luck – Luxemburg’s late equaliser was an incredible fluke; against Portugal, Northern Ireland were anything but lucky. It was a point earned by discipline, commitment, shape and poise. It was a point earned by preparation.

Whilst at Shamrock Rovers, O’Neill quietly bemoaned the lack of preparation time once his players had made it so impressively into the group stage of the Europa League for the first time.

Before Tuesday’s qualifier in Porto – a match marketed as Cristiano Ronaldo’s 100th cap procession – O’Neill was delighted to have a week-long camp in Portugal. The work there showed on the night. Even without the West Brom pair, Gareth McAuley and Chris Brunt – two of just a few Premier League players O’Neill can select – O’Neill had time to prepare.

Afterwards he would salute his coaching staff and players for their attitude while in Portugal, but O’Neill merits some praise too.

Midway through the second half, for example, Aaron Hughes made a crucial block on Ronaldo. Hughes had retired from international football towards the end of Nigel Worthington’s tenure; O’Neill got him back.

That is management. So, too, is the work O’Neill puts in each week. Based back in Edinburgh, where his children are at school, O’Neill was spotted at St James’ Park for the Newcastle United-Bordeaux Europa League game the Thursday before the international break. It was to watch the only player available to him, Shane Ferguson.

But it turns out that O’Neill was at Middlesbrough-Derby the night before and Hull City-Blackpool the night before that. In neither game can O’Neill have had more than one player to watch.

Reports in Scotland then noted O’Neill watching Hibs-Dundee on the Saturday (Ryan McGivern is on loan at Hibs) before a return to St James’ for Newcastle-Manchester United (Ferguson again and Jonny Evans).

As others have testified, the size of population means that it is not easy being manager of Northern Ireland. It is hard work – within the IFA they know of at least one Championship reserve game O’Neill has been to recently.

It is hard work all right; there’s little glamour at Burnley reserves. But it is hard work that Michael O’Neill is prepared to do.

It's Wonga but that's corporate cynicism

TOMORROW Newcastle United play their first game since the announcement of their controversial sponsorship with the payday-loan company, Wonga. The space between the announcement and this first game – a derby at Sunderland – is presumably not a co-incidence.

People have had enough time to get bored of the story and the arguments it provoked.

Newcastle United are not stupid – cynical, but not stupid. They knew there would be arguments because they knew the Wonga sponsorship is provocative. Those who say it isn't are ignoring the reaction, a reaction that is neither invented nor stemming from an anti-Newcastle origin.

As Newcastle United Supporters Trust confirmed this week, a section of the club's own fans are dismayed. Dismay sounds like a weak response, when set against outrage or anger, but it is part of an erosion of affection and respect that we hear increasingly.

This is what happens when corporate cynicism invades. The effect of a slogan such as 'second is nowhere' seems negligible. But neither the second tier of English football is called Second, nor is League Two ever referred to as 'second'.

Second is unacceptable, 'nowhere' apparently. Winning's the thing, you see. Except by winning, what is meant is 'me winning' or 'us winning'. Not you.

'Winning is everything' - the sort of mantra Lance Armstrong repeated. Armstrong was a cynic too – someone with strong hand, commercial cunning, and a willingness to push it as far as possible.