SOCCER/World Cup 2006 qualifying: After their unexpectedly lengthened stay on the Faroe Islands the Irish players were due brief stop-offs in Dublin and back in England yesterday before most headed off on overdue summer holidays. Emmet Malone, Soccer correspondent, reports.

The relief after Wednesday's game that a long and hard season was behind finally them was clear but most will have only four to five weeks off.

The next time they will gather for an Ireland game will be in mid-August when Italy come to Dublin but the next one that matters will be on Wednesday, September 7th, when the Republic take on France in Lansdowne Road in a match that will go a long way towards deciding who finally emerges from this tightly-contested group to claim a place at next year's World Cup, and who will grab the consolation prize of a play-off place.

Wednesday's win leaves Brian Kerr's side top of the Group Four table until September but there is really nothing separating the four top sides, with the French, for instance, potentially in a position to come to Dublin as front-runners if they beat the Faroe Islands handsomely in Paris four days earlier while the Swiss and the Israelis meet in Berne that same evening.

After Saturday's blunder against Avraham Grant's side, however, the Irish have done all they can for the moment and the players went their separate ways yesterday afternoon with some confidence restored and the belief they can win the big home games to come and progress as group winners.

"That's all we could have expected," said Kevin Kilbane, whose rather fortuitous second-half goal for Ireland at the Torsvollur Stadium in Torshavn more or less killed off the challenge of the home side on what was, at times, an uncomfortable night for the visitors.

"I think people were disappointed after what happened at the weekend, but we got through this game and picked up a big three points so it's all in our hands now.

"If we win the next three games," he added, "then that's us, but it's going to be tough and there are going to be some ups and downs to come along the way, I'm sure."

Chief amongst the potential downs would be losing to the French who will come to Dublin needing to avoid defeat but aiming to win in order to belatedly assert some measure of control over their own destiny.

Though they have done little to justify their status as top seeds to date, they still have the potential to beat any team in their group on their day.

Kilbane, though, insists that the Irish can make home advantage count and score a win that would go a long way towards securing them at least a top-two finish.

"I suppose they've a lot of quality players, but with us being at home I will feel very confident going into it," he says. "We need to get at them and make it very difficult for them, but we will go into the game full of confidence.

"If we go into the Switzerland game (Ireland's match on the qualifying tournament's last day in October) needing a win to qualify," he adds, " I think we'll be okay because we're strong enough to get a result against them."

Before then, Kilbane may have written himself into the Irish record books with the Everton midfielder going into September's meeting with the French aiming to play in his 34th competitive international in a row.

That would better Packie Bonner's record and would be all the more remarkable given the 28-year-old is an outfield player who has switched positions since the run started in the first of the play-off games against Turkey in November, 1999 and has retained his place in central midfield despite the return of Roy Keane.

"I'm aware of it," he says of the record with a smile, "but a lot can happen between now and then. I'll have games with Everton before then but, injuries permitting, I'm hoping to be there and, hopefully, I'll be in form. I'm pleased with the way it has gone, though. I think it started when I was at West Brom, so it's been good and I just hope I can be selected for the game."

Having established what is clearly Kerr's first-choice midfield partnership with Keane it seems only injury can prevent him breaking the record and if the pair can reproduce the sort of form they showed in Paris last September then Ireland could well secure the win they need to move a huge step closer to a place at another World Cup finals.