Empty stands take pressure off new coach
“What Kenny
needs most of all is time”
AT least we now know that disgruntlement doesn’t need 50,000 people to find expression. The Irish players and their new manager, through increasingly frantic shouts and pleas and curses, made vivid the creeping desperation in an empty Aviva Stadium.
This revolution will not be swift or straightforward, and it did not require the groans of a capacity crowd at the final whistle to make that apparent.
Ireland were mostly poor here, from a first half where they had plenty of possession but little by way of attacking cut, to a second that came more and more under the ownership of a plainly ordinary Finland.
The hopes generated by the accession of Stephen Kenny should not be abandoned, but the sheer extent of what he wishes to achieve with the national team is now, after two matches, starkly clear.
His conviction that there is a better way for this team to play has been persuasively argued off the field. Giving it sporting form will take some time.
The response to Shane Duffy’s equaliser on Thursday night came heavily seasoned in ‘I told you so’, as if Kenny’s notions had been exposed, and his first game relied on rudimentary tradition to save it.
But it’s possible to trust in an ambitious, more expansive style while still making the most of Ireland’s established strength at set-pieces.
It’s not either-or, and Kenny will hope that becomes apparent to the doubters and the sceptics.
Until then, it will help that home games, in particular, will take place in empty stadia for the foreseeable future.
It was very easy to imagine fidgeting giving way to unease among a packed crowd yesterday evening. Supporters would have been entitled to feel put off by much of Ireland’s play, especially in a scattered and unfocused second half.
The new manager is trying to oversee the most radical tactical overhaul in Irish sport in years, however.
The magnitude of what he is trying to implement shouldn’t be forgotten. Ireland’s successes of the past three decades came with teams that cleaved to what was called a traditional British style – and one that no leading British club has pursued for decades.
First do no harm was the creed: be resolute, hard to break down, and unforgiving in the physical exchanges.
Put ‘em under pressure, as the country once sang.
Kenny has advocated a more nuanced, ambitious game plan, and it seems clear he will not be dissuaded. And it is absurd to judge its entire worth on two matches, with Ireland playing a different midfield in each one.
What can be said, though, is that it will be a very big challenge for Kenny.
It would take months for a club team to become accustomed to a radically different approach, and it would only come about after hours of training, day after day.
That is time an international manager doesn’t have, so Kenny will rely on the quality of his coaching, and that of his support staff, and the technical accomplishment of his players.
Robbie Brady should be someone with the skill to thrive, and he started as part of the midfield overhaul, after his encouraging contribution in the final quarter against the Bulgarians.
He provided the assist for Duffy’s equaliser, and the standard of his passing should be required if the team is to wean itself off Hail Mary crosses and dunts up the field.
But he flickered through this contest, occasionally bright but also wasteful and looking, frankly, like a player who has endured years ravaged by injury.
Should he be able to play matches for Burnley in the coming season, though, it’s easy to see him becoming important in Kenny’s plans.
That goes for Harry Arter, too, back in an Irish jersey after being mostly ignored by Mick McCarthy, and after an argument with Roy Keane came with inevitable consequences in the O’Neill era.
Arter played at the back of midfield, but the fragility that Bulgaria exploited was evident at times again. It looked like two decent passes would be enough to put the Finns through on goal, and that is down to more than lapses on the part of the defenders alone.
Yet what Arter brings is aggression and decent mobility, and Kenny’s tactics will only work if there is some defensive structure in his midfield three.
Arter could be the man to provide that, but midfield is now the intriguing part of this side. Jayson Molumby was captain of the Under 21 team under Kenny, and on his debut the Waterford man, who only turned 21 a month ago, showed consistent composure.
He looks the kind of disciplined, tactically aware player that Kenny will need.
But what the manager will need most of all is time. And he will have the freedom that comes with playing in front of empty stands. No manager or player can ever come out and say that is a relief, but it could come to feel that for an Ireland side in the early stages or transformation.
The team lookede bedraggledafter Finland’s goal, and the cribbing about them passing the ball endlessly was silenced as ball after ball was instead booted away.
It betrayed a tired team. The keep-ball imperative gave way to a rather more desperate search for an equaliser, as illustrated by the arrival of James McClean as a replacement for the final 15 minutes.
It did not work. The revolution remains, for now, a theoretical goal.
There is much to be done.