Martin O’Neill interview: ‘There’s a sense that we can really go on’

Martin O'Neill admits he expects to re-enter Celtic Park and turn right to the home dressing room but other than that he is adamant he can treat Friday's European Championship qualifier with Scotland as just another away game.

After all, the Republic of Ireland manager points out, he is not the only former Celtic manager who should be well received back at their old home ground.

Gordon Strachan will lead the hosts out and the two sides from these islands are well in the hunt for a place in France 2016 but, while the current Scotland manager was also a success in his stint in charge of Celtic, it is O'Neill who will never be forgotten as the manager who turned the balance of power in Glasgow on its head for "one of the greatest clubs in the world".

Celtic’s banishment from the throne of Scottish football had reached a trough with a cup defeat by Caledonian Thistle and a title contest lost by 21 points when O’Neill arrived from Leicester City in 2000, but it was as if he plugged the team into the Celtic Park electric circuit as they won his first Old Firm game 6-2.

Despite then losing 5-1 at Ibrox, Celtic won the treble for the first time since 1968 and went on to record an unprecedented seven consecutive derby victories. In his five years they won seven trophies and reached their first Uefa Cup final.

It was an emotional rollercoaster, ended by his decision to take time out from football to care for his wife, Geraldine, but while he fully appreciates his period at Celtic there is no danger of it clouding his focus.

“I had a great time at Celtic,” O’Neill said in Beaconsfield last week, celebrating his first anniversary in the job. “They are a fantastic football club, one of the greatest in the world, and if there was a united Premier League they could build an extra tier and still fill 85,000 every home game.

“I’ve not been back to take charge of a competitive game before but the difference is that although I’m going back to Celtic Park, a place I could call home for several years, and while I might turn right instead of left as we go into the dressing rooms – I don’t think I’ve ever set foot in the away dressing room before – this is a game against Scotland, not against Celtic. So all the nuances end there.”

Reminded that as “Martin the magnificent” he may well get lauded by tens of thousands of Celtic fans as he emerges into the playing arena, O’Neill said: “But Gordon Strachan’s there as well, he’s going home, and I assume Scott Brown [the Scotland and Celtic captain] might be playing.

“I’m not going back to Celtic Park to represent a club [against the one] that I loved for several years, I’m going for a different challenge. That’s not me playing it down, that’s the reality.”

If O’Neill’s return is likely to be accompanied by a metaphorical fanfare of trumpets, another former Celtic favourite playing in green can expect to be booed to the hilt, which Strachan has already condoned, as Aiden McGeady, whom O’Neill brought through at the club, Scottish-born of a Scottish father with a Scottish accent, prepares to play against them.

James McCarthy, his Everton team-mate of similar ancestry, may also be accused of treachery but McGeady’s illustrious time at Celtic leaves him first in the firing line.

“He has chosen to play for Ireland which is his prerogative,” O’Neill said of the 28-year-old in a joint interview with the Guardian and Fanbookz.com.

“At the time he chose, I may well have been his manager at Celtic. I have to say now that, although at the time I had absolutely nothing to do with his decision, I am absolutely delighted he chose to follow his forefathers from Donegal.

“Remember that while the game is being played at Celtic Park it will not be made up necessarily all of Celtic-chanting supporters. [Booing or cheering] is the prerogative of fans to choose. But I don’t think it would have an impact on such a precocious kid.

“It’s natural you would prefer people to applaud a piece of brilliance, but he’s gained experience and at the age he’s at I think he’ll take this in his stride.”

McGeady's winning goal away to Georgia in September, as late as it was brilliant, launched the Republic of Ireland on a campaign that augurs well following the incredible draw against Germany in Gelsenkirchen, when John O'Shea, picking up his 100th cap, equalised in the 94th minute. O'Neill does not write his own scripts but he knows how to help teams enact them.

“It was euphoric in the dressing room, absolutely euphoric,” O’Neill says. “There’s a sense that we can really go on. Looking back at Aiden McGeady’s wonder goal in Georgia as well, there’s a realisation that we’ve scored late goals and there is something about the side that keeps going.

“There’s certain things in our team that we possess, and certain things that we lack. It would be great to have more creativity in the team but while you have the likes of Aiden McGeady on the pitch, there’s the possibility of conjuring something up from very little, and you need that. The best teams have this.

“We haven’t got that number of match-winners in the team that other sides of greater repute possess. But what we do have is a real fighting spirit, which you should expect from the Irish.”

Avoiding defeat on Friday would leave O’Neill’s side in a better position than they might have dared hope when the draw was made. The top two qualify from each group for an expanded Euro 2016, with at least a play-off for coming third, and the manager says: “Germany will win the group, leaving the rest of us to scrap it out.”

He believes next year will be decisive. “We have seven points on the board. After the Scotland game, regardless of the result, our fate will depend on 2015 when we have four of the next five games at the Aviva Stadium. We will have three really tough away games out the way, Georgia, Germany and Scotland.

“We have got four points on board from six away from home. We would have taken that easily before the competition started. We need to stay in the mix.”

Guardian service