Quickly back in the thick of things

In truth, Kenny Cunningham thought this would be a light week workwise. His rehabilitation at Wimbledon has been under way for some time, but he felt that after the miracles of Amsterdam and Lisbon there would be no way back into the Irish defence until a catastrophe of some sort occurred.

He came to international duty ready for once for a stint on the bench, watching Gary Breen develop his partnership with Richard Dunne. Mick McCarthy had other ideas.

"I didn't expect to play. I knew it would be hard to drop Richard, so I was slightly surprised. On Friday Mick pulled me aside and said `You're in the team'. He's straightforward about things like that and I think he had a chat with Richard about it too. "Richard was in good form, wished me the best of luck, he took it as you'd expect him to. He'll be the mainstay of this team for 10 years. So I'm a bit disappointed for Richard, but while I've got the jersey I'm pleased and I know he's ready to step in."

The game at the GSP Stadium on Saturday night was a tolerable re-immersion in international football, a suitable way to rediscover the subtleties of the game at the higher level.

"It was okay. As I've said before, it helps when you have good players around you. We knew we had to win in Cyprus if we had any thoughts of qualifying. There were periods when we didn't pass too well and put ourselves under pressure, but hopefully we can put together a more convincing performance against Andorra." Cunningham was at the centre of one of the most alarming passages, picking up a yellow card and flirting with the disaster of dismissal as the Cypriots poured forward in the first half. His booking for a sideways-on tackle seemed a little harsh, but it brought detachment.

"I thought I made clean contact with the ball. I noticed, though, with the ref that even sideways he was making a thing of tackles, unless you took it ever so cleanly. Just seconds after that Mark (Kinsella) misplaced a short ball, and I was covering. Their centre forward was in and I was a little off balance. "My hands were behind me and for a split second I thought I was going to headbutt him. Instead I took the upper half of my body away in case he'd go down. It was just a split-second decision but I could have been walking off. He stayed on his feet and Shay saved the shot. If it had gone in it would have been 2-1 and the bad memories would have come back."

The team flew yesterday to Barcelona for the second and easier leg of their assignment. Cunningham, though, has seen too many away-day disasters to be complacent.

"The Andorrans still have to be beaten. We have to prepare the same way as we prepared for the Cyprus game. Mick and Ian will give us the information we need, we'll watch their previous games. The onus is on us to take it to them."

McCarthy has spoken all along about matching what the other big teams in the group do in places like Andorra. In Cyprus on Saturday the Irish matched precisely what the Dutch had achieved there. While they were doing that, the Dutch were putting five goals past the Andorrans. Cunningham feels that the point has already been made.

"I think we sent a message to the Dutch when we went and played them in the first game. If they were under an illusion that we'd be the whipping boys of the group, I think we put them in their place in Amsterdam that night. It's building up nicely towards the last few games. We have two against Andorra now, and then the big one against Portugal is looming in June. We'll know more then. That's when we'll know."