Shane McGrath: James McClean is way off
FREE SPEECH is for everyone. It allows Gary Breen and Stephen Hunt to give their views on the departure of Mick McCarthy and the accession of Stephen Kenny.
James McClean is not impressed with them. He made that obvious in an interview with the Derry
Journal that showed McClean’s capacity for blundering into controversy is not constrained by his absence from social media.
The traditional ways work for him, too.
‘Stephen (Hunt) is probably best known for his clash with Petr Cech, so for him to give his opinion on Stephen (Kenny) is a joke,’ said McClean, in a comment notable for more than its nastiness.
He is entitled to consider Hunt’s view a joke, but Hunt’s right to give it should be understood by McClean, who has gone to great lengths to defend his own rights to selfexpression.
Expecting consistency from a man who was fined two weeks wages by his club and obliged to delete his Instagram account after a post that showed him wearing a balaclava as he joked about home-schooling his children, is probably a stretch.
His loyalty to Kenny is understandable, given the time they spent together at Derry City. Breen’s contention that ‘everyone keeps talking about Dundalk but he has failed elsewhere and still has a lot to prove’ was certainly a broad lash, but it was not outrageous to suppose that Kenny does have an enormous amount to prove.
Hunt said much the same, and McClean’s broadside is an extreme example of the sensitivity among Kenny’s advocates to scrutiny of his record, let alone criticism.
Nobody knows how good he will be, but the task ahead of him is daunting.
He impressed with the Under 21s, playing an ambitious style with talented young players, some of whom are bursting with promise. Unless he rewards these talents with promotions, he will not have their potential at senior level.
He takes over a group that are admirably honest, who will work like stevedores, but who a succession of managers have decided will do best with a cautious, pragmatic gameplan.
Now this is where Kenny could be inspirational. He may well have the skills to elevate Ireland’s play in a way that Giovanni Trapattoni, Martin O’Neill and Mick McCarthy have not.
David Forde’s insight into Kenny was fascinating, and he described a figure with an acute understanding of players’ motivational needs. That is important at international level, where managers only get fleeting periods with their squads and the room for technical development is limited.
However, tactical acumen is vital, and Kenny’s advocates point to his strengths in this area, particularly during Dundalk’s European run in 2016.
Beating Bate Borisov in a Champions League qualifier was considered a sensation, before drawing away to AZ Alkmaar and beating Maccabi Tel Aviv at home in the Europa League.
The man is highly talented, and his appointment could well be transformative.
What recurs in his interviews is his determination to play in a way that is more expansive than is usually associated with Irish teams.
‘It’s important not to have the mindset that because we’re from this part of the world we’re less skilful so we have to rely on physical attributes and determination and that’s it,’ he said in an interview in 2016.
‘That mindset has existed for a long time. It certainly hasn’t served our clubs well.’
Nor has it done much for the national team over most of the past two decades.
Since the stock of players making regular appearances in the Premier League has diminished to a spare few, managers have not been able to call upon the talent that Jack Charlton and McCarthy, in his first iteration as national manager, could.
Therefore they have resorted to rudimentary tactics.
This, though, hasn’t worked, either, save for the Euro 2016 qualifying campaign under Martin O’Neill, and the odd brave moment at the tournament itself.
Kenny’s commitment to a very different way deserves its chance, and supporters of the national team are entitled to be very excited. What James McClean and Kenny’s more vociferous backers also need to accept is that their man will be subject to great scrutiny in his new role.
That should not be taken as a slight. Kenny’s job is the most prominent one in Irish sport, and he has taken it in controversial circumstances.
He will not be known to many of the players soon to be under his tutelage, and they will have questions about him, too.
That is not disrespectful. Pundits giving opinions should not be read as attacks, either.
Questions and issues abound. Raising them is only proper.