Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
THE WIDE CLIF
With Ireland teetering on the edge, Keane warns minnows could force us right over the precipice
MARTIN O’NEILL’S prediction that we’re in for a “nervy 90 minutes” against Moldova didn’t exactly scream confidence going into a must-win game.
For Monday’s potential play-off showdown in Wales to mean anything, Ireland have to dispose of the
Group D minnows by any means necessary.
But it’s worth bearing in mind why O’neill and his players cannot afford to take anything for granted on home soil – because their problems are of their own making. And here is the reminder.
To date, Ireland have scored just two goals at home in this entire World Cup campaign.
Only Latvia, Faroes Islands, San Marino and Liechtenstein have scored fewer on their own patch.
Even Moldova themselves have bagged three goals in Chisinau, although they have scored just the one on their travels.
But Ireland’s poor return at Aviva Stadium doesn’t scream ‘World Cup finalists’, does it? And it’s a fact not lost on assistant boss Roy Keane (below). “If you don’t beat Moldova at home then you shouldn’t be expecting to qualify for too many tournaments,” he said yesterday.
Little wonder then that the management team have reached for additional firepower this week.
Jon Walters is injured, Kevin Doyle has retired and Shane Long and Daryl Murphy are still the likely strike force on Friday.
But uncapped Scott Hogan of Aston Villa, Preston’s Sean Maguire and Aiden O’brien of Millwall are all champing at the bit to be heroes in green over these two games. What Ireland would have done for a clinical finisher in Georgia, or in those dominant dying stages of the spirited defeat to Serbia last month.
Keane said yesterday: “Obviously you want your players to hold it up and you want them running the channels.
“But there have been a number of times, even in the last 15-20 minutes, when we’ve had balls into the box and you’re waiting for a player to make the right run or get on the end of it. You want someone who is a goalscorer, who has that knack. And if you look at their track record, Maguire and Hogan, they do know where the back of the net is.
“We just haven’t had someone of that nature. Maybe one or two of these lads would be more of a poacher for us.”
Keane added: “Even the few clips we have seen in training today, I’ve liked the look of that.
“It’s something different to the others –
Jonathan Walters,
Shane Long, who is good at stretching teams but sometimes you need that fox in the box.
“And they have got that,
Maguire and
Hogan. They have that in their
DNA. Whether they can go produce it at international level, it’s easier said than done.”
Keane is also calling on the players themselves to hone their ‘football intelligence’ going into these make-or-break games.
Keane said: “We’re here to encourage them but ultimately it’s not in our hands. That’s where football intelligence comes into it.
“If we can’t get a result on Friday, well, you don’t deserve to qualify. At some stage you have to start winning football matches and our last couple of results haven’t been up to scratch.”