Savaging of 'Stan' does us little credit

Sideline Cut: In a pub off Grafton Street on Wednesday evening, a young man from the frozen plains of Saskatchewan happened to fall into conversation with, as Paulie Walnuts might put it, "a guy with connections" and the guy made a phone call and the Canadian found himself in possession of a couple of complimentary tickets so he could take his girlfriend to the big soccer night in Croke Park, writes Keith Duggan.

This is why travel guides list Ireland as the friendliest country in the world. "Some day," the Guy With Connections said, pressing the tickets into the grateful Canadian's hands "and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me."

Ice hockey was the guy's main sport but he knew soccer and seemed to share, over pints, in the general late-afternoon delight of watching Russia do down England. He had learned a little of Croke Park and was eager to head to the stadium early to walk around and soak up the history. As the mood in the ground went from impatient to downright malevolent, I did not know whether to feel more sorry for Steve Staunton or the bewildered Canadian, who must have checked with neighbours on several occasions to verify if he should be cheering the green team or the Cypriots. He probably got several different answers. What a mixed-up and sad night for Irish sport it was.

This morning Steve Staunton will be under no illusions that his former champions in Merrion Square have cut him adrift. It is all very well for Eamon Dunphy to rant away on television or for the red-top newspapers to gleefully pillory Staunton, but even the kingmakers in the FAI become nervous when the proletariat begin to voice anger. As the booing sounded around Croke Park on Wednesday evening and the Cypriots almost inevitably took a lead, Staunton's reign was all but done.

And for his mental and physical health, that may be for the best. Staunton has appeared pitifully stressed and defiant during and after the last four matches, clearly in a deeply unpleasant and vulnerable situation as he tried to maintain at least the veneer of authority over a beast gone out of control.

It seems certain now the public will get what the public want: a good, old-fashioned execution in the square, a walk of shame from Staunton from a reign overshadowed by thinly veiled condescension from the start: the months of derision and lame satire offered on RTÉ radio at a guy who was foolish enough to speak in his native Dundalk drawl - unlike the pseudo-urbane patter that prevails in Montrose - the mauling of Staunton's character in countless cheap newspaper headlines, and the general portrayal of the country's most decorated player as a buffoon.

It seems appropriate that the end of the Staunton tenure should coincide with Government warnings that we brace ourselves against the cold winds of economic frigidity. Boom times are over and all that. In the months and years to come, we will look back at the treatment of Steven Staunton - not as a manager but as a human being - as cheap and nasty and despicable.

The sacking of Staunton will remain as an embarrassing example of how small and harsh and impatient and deluded the general attitude has become in the national desire to be perceived as winners, as players on the main stage.

It is undeniable that Staunton's first term was far from impressive. It has, of course, ended in failure - as all bar four of Ireland's attempts to qualify for international soccer tournaments have done.

And of those four, it is easily forgotten that it took an improbable goal in Sofia from one Gary Mackay to allow us to slip into Euro '88 as the self-styled darlings of the competition. It has been forgotten that Jack Charlton had luck on his side too in the malevolent theatre of Windsor Park in November 1993 when our qualification hopes hung by a thread, saved by Alan McLoughlin's immortal goal and the fact that the Spain-Denmark result went our way. It is forgotten that in qualifying for Japan/Korea 2002, Ireland benefited from an almost superhuman desire and sustained performance from Roy Keane.

There has been much revisionist talk, in the light of Staunton's meltdown, about how Mick McCarthy was the best manager this country has had. And maybe he was. He was definitely unlucky not to qualify for more major finals. But McCarthy made mistakes too: this was a manager who admitted not realising Spain were down to 10 men during extra time of the second-round match at the 2002 finals and, whatever your perspective, lost the services of his best player in the preparation for that tournament. And Mick too, heard the frosty side of the "best fans in the world" the following winter: he too knew the loneliness of the place Staunton finds himself this week.

FAI chief executive John Delaney's carefully worded comments managed to put an ocean of distance between himself and the Irish manager on Thursday evening. The problem for the FAI is not that they are perceived now to have made a mistake but that they made two. They made a mistake in sacking Brian Kerr, whose style of management was criticised for being too technical, too full of knowledge about the opposition teams and too organised. There wasn't enough of the old Charltonesque spirit and devilment. It was as though Staunton's appointment was an instinctive reaction to those grumbling complaints from the players.

And they made a mistake in bringing in Bobby Robson. Pairing Staunton with the grandfather of the English game was one of those strange lightning flashes of left-field genius that strikes the television aerial and electrifies the executives in Merrion Square every so often. But now Staunton has been judged a failure, the FAI must accept that they compounded their original mistake.

Staunton did himself no favours in the past few weeks, with his erratic team selections and his stubborn-as-a-mule persistence with certain players. He did himself no favours by not trying to charm the soccer pressmen more thoroughly and can count himself lucky to have been given a decent chance by several correspondents.

But he was facing an army of sceptics from the moment he was appointed, made an object of fun because of Delaney's ill-considered promise of a "world-class manager". Staunton was cursed with injuries. It was hardly his fault Robson was imposed upon him and subsequently waylaid by illness. And the assertion Staunton has - or had - a highly promising group of young players at his command has yet to be borne out.

And even in the face of the outcry over Lee Carsley, the embarrassment against Cyprus in Nicosia, the sideline outburst in Germany, the selection controversy in Prague and the blinkered refusal to admit to his own shortcomings, the portrayal of Staunton as clueless nonetheless rankles.

It is simply hard to believe a football man who is used to winning - who played on the last league-winning Liverpool team, was used to succeeding and lived in football dressingrooms for 15 years - does not know more about the game than those who sit in the press boxes or, for that matter, in the television studios of RTÉ.

The writing was on the wall for Staunton as early as his third match in charge, the 4-0 collapse against Holland in a friendly match. He was on trial from that moment and he faced a loaded and hostile jury. Maybe Staunton would eventually have cut it or maybe his temperament meant he was just not suited to that life. Either way, he did not deserve to be placed in the stocks and pelted with rotting fruit. He did not deserve to be treated like a national joke in the friendliest country on earth.