Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
CHRISTIE MORE
Cyrus aims to become an Irish folk hero by silencing his critics & helping O’neill’s troops reach the World Cup
CYRUS CHRISTIE loves it when a plan comes together but wishes people would stop measuring him against Seamus Coleman.
Aside from their failure to nab a priceless away goal, the Middlesbrough right-back claims Ireland followed the script to the letter in Copenhagen.
In his eyes, the team could not have executed the defensive gameplan better and it was just unfortunate that his own chance did not result in more.
“An away goal would have been nice but that game is gone,” he said. “We have to move onto tomorrow, win the game and come out on top.
“We’ve risen to the challenge on plenty of occasions when people have written us off and I’m sure we can put on another special night.”
Christie has been Ireland’s first-choice right-back since Neil Taylor broke Coleman’s leg in two places back in March.
And they were big boots to fill as team captain Coleman has emerged as one of the best full-backs in Europe.
Had the play-offs been next month, the Everton ace would most likely have been available as he is making rapid progress from the horror injury.
Team-mates have already admitted they are playing with Coleman in their minds as they chase down their World Cup dream. Since the injury, the Donegal man has been a regular around the squad, offering moral support, and he was in Copenhagen on Saturday.
Christie, 25, has taken all his 16 caps in his stride and rarely puts in a bad shift, so is perplexed at some of the slights coming his way. “I think I’ve played well on numerous occasions,” he said. “Some people are always going to compare me to Seamus and I’ve come in for a bit of flak which I think is unfair.
“I feel I’ve defended well, we’ve kept clean sheets, although at times I haven’t been able to get forward as much as I like to.
“I’m relatively inexperienced compared to a lot of the lads on the international stage.
“I’m going to make mistakes but it’s about how I bounce back from that and how I rectify them and move on.”
Christie added: “Seamus is a massive miss. Everyone knows that. You know what kind of player he is, he’s fantastic and he’s at the top of his game in the Premiership.
“He’s probably been the best full-back in the Premiership in the last few years so he’s been a big miss and big boots to fill but hopefully I’m doing an OK job.
“I’ve got a job to do for the team. All of the boys were fantastic and everyone put in a shift – we need to follow that up tomorrow.”
For Christie and others in the side, this will be the biggest game of their careers but the Boro man has stressed the need for cool, calm heads.
Ireland’s best form tends to come on the road and they have struggled to make the most of games on home soil. They are jittery affairs – more than they ought to be.
Christie said: “Copenhagen was probably one of the best away performances you could probably do and we need to make it count.
“But we’re not going to overthink it, we know what’s at stake and know what we have to do to get to Russia.
“It’s a boyhood dream for everyone to play in a World Cup and the Aviva will be rocking like it was against Bosnia and there’s no reason why we can’t do it.
“We know what’s at stake – it has come down to one game and we are 90 minutes away from going to a World Cup.”