WE’VE NEEDED FRIENDLY FIRE

Delaney welcomes stiffer tests for Ireland after run of ‘stat packing’ matches during Kenny’s reign that failed to help team improve

DAMIEN DELANEY feels it’s about time Ireland played stronger nations in friendlies, rather than “stat packing” against weaker ones.

Interim boss John O’shea will name his squad this Thursday for the March 23 and 26 friendlies against Belgium and Switzerland at Aviva Stadium.

The FAI will appoint a permanent manager in early April who will take their bow in a home friendly against Hungary in June before another in Portugal a week later.

All four of those nations have qualified for the Euros in Germany this summer and Delaney believes they will be a stern test as a result, which the ex-ireland defender didn’t think was the case with some of the friendlies under Stephen Kenny.

Delaney said: “Top opposition will magnify any weakness that you have. They will find it – the analyst before the game will find it and the players on the pitch will find it.

“And afterwards you’ll come in and think ‘Oh my god, we didn’t know that area was an issue for us but it is’. But that’s how you find it.

“Those friendlies we picked (under Kenny) were bloody bad. You’re looking at them and going, what are we learning from this, what are we gaining from this?

“If you were cynical, you could argue we picked them to stat pack possibly.

“But there was nothing in it for us. We should have been doing the best we could to get the highest calibre possible, especially in friendlies.”

While Kenny was wedded to a particular style of football, interim boss O’shea says his Ireland team will be a ‘mix of everything’ for the Belgium and Switzerland games.

And that’s music to Delaney’s ears as he reckons Kenny’s Ireland were too stubborn to vary their approach.

Delaney added: “I always felt the argument was Giovanni Trapattoni or Stephen Kenny and there was no middle ground. But there should be.

“You have to open up and play football, because in modern football you can’t keep giving the ball to the opposition as they will get you eventually.

“You have to have some tariff on possession, but it can’t be too much.

“You can’t enjoy yourselves to the extent we did where people were drifting into areas and leaving gaping holes. We were so vulnerable to the counter attack.

“There’s also something structurally wrong with your team if you keep giving up shots (and goals from distance.)

“I didn’t think the structural make-up of the team was right. But that’s why I think John O’shea’s answer is right, that we can be a little bit of everything.”