Darren Randolph has ambitions beyond Austria game

A little over a year on from the game in which an injury to Shay Given catapulted him unexpectedly to number one status, Darren Randolph recognises that the competition for his Ireland shirt is intensifying again. However, he seems untroubled by the pressure.

Martin O'Neill sprang a significant surprise last October when he replaced Given with Randolph rather than David Forde. However, Keiren Westwood and Colin Doyle now complete the squad's goalkeeping line-up. And with Rob Elliot set to be fully fit again by the time Ireland are in action again next spring, the manager's options are getting stronger.

“I’m not the kind to lose sleep over or worry about someone else,” says Randolph. “I spoke to Rob the other day; he had his first training session with the boys and it’s good that he’s back after being out for so long with that injury but without sounding too mean, I don’t care what the other boys are doing; I focus on myself.”

At international level that is paying dividends, with the 29-year-old retaining his place through the European Championship finals in France and into the start of this World Cup qualifying campaign despite not being first choice at his club.

Displacing West Ham United’s first choice goalkeeper Adrian at the London Stadium would seem a good deal more realistic with the team struggling the way it is. However, Randolph is wary of appearing disloyal to the cause and says he has settled for doing his talking on the training ground, rather than going to Slaven Bilic and making his case directly.

Strong position

If Martin O’Neill decides to changes horses in the meantime, he will, he insists, accept the decision, but for now he takes encouragement from the manager’s apparent determination to stand by players who have never let him down.

“It’s been shown that if you perform for him, he’ll reward you,” he says. “But the fact that Westie has started playing more games . . . I have to hold my hand up. Again, there’s nothing I can do. My situation is that it is. If I don’t play, I don’t play.”

He seems certain to play in Vienna where, he says, even a draw would put Ireland in a very strong position going into the new year but beyond that he will be under persistent pressure to retain his place.

For Doyle, meanwhile, the challenge is just to stay involved. The 31-year-old is anxious to make an impression during this, his first bout of international duty for seven years.

It was another two before that when Doyle earned his only senior cap and the recall, he says, took him slightly by surprise, even if it had been a long-term target.

“The club [League One’s Bradford City] didn’t tell me at first to be honest because they didn’t realise you release the provisional squad to the press. So they were just not going to tell me in case I wasn’t in the full squad,” he says.

“But it got announced that I was in the provisional squad and my mate texted me to say, ‘congratulations’ with a picture of an Ireland flag. I put two and two together and then I got a phone call on Sunday.

“It’s different from my last call-up in 2009. We trained in Portmarnock the last time and I thought I’d be arriving there.”

Challenges

It has been quite a journey for the Cork man in the years since, with challenges on both the personal and professional fronts.

In terms of his career, he stayed at Birmingham City when he clearly needed to leave. Eventually, he did, for Blackpool, where he was to have a clause allowing him to move again for free if the club was relegated, which it was.

The league said that, as he was midway through a two-year contract, however, there had to be a fee of some sort.

“We just said £1 and they agreed to it. I think they [Bradford] paid it so I’m still waiting for my 10 per cent. I must chase that up,” he says.

He says he has no real regrets about any of that, though, because he and his family have been through so much together with Liam, his young son, who almost died after contracting meningitis.

“In hindsight I probably could have left Birmingham a little earlier in my career, but for family reasons it was difficult at the time. When Liam was born, he had meningitis. It suited us to stay where we were at the time,” he says.

Now, he says, Liam is doing well and he is keen to recover some lost momentum.

“All I want to do is play games,” he says, which he is what he is doing at Bradford. “My aim [with Ireland] is to stay in the squad. Whether it’s as one, two or three, I want to be in that three.”