Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
TRUTH OR DARR FOR THIS SQUAD
Randolph: We must be honest.. & brave
DARREN RANDOLPH insists it’s not the end of the world for calamity-hit Ireland as they search for an end to their winless streak in Cardiff.
Matt Doherty didn’t mince his words at Wembley after Thursday night’s 3-0 loss to England when he revealed he felt “embarrassed” at times during the six-game winless run under new boss Stephen Kenny.
The Spurs star (inset) also said the Ireland squad had to “wake up” and insisted: “We have to go out with full focus and be men, to take it on.
“It’s not going well for us now but it has to change.”
Ahead of tomorrow’s Nations League clash with Wales, there was yet another obstacle placed in Kenny’s way when Alan Browne tested positive for Covid-19 – the third Ireland player to do so in the last two international windows.
Kenny and his team can’t catch a break and the manager has to hold his nerve now.
“It ’s a tricky situation ,” sai d Randolph. “If a new manager comes in and wins all the games, it’s brilliant.
“The performances have been there. We just haven’t got the results and all of a sudden it can seem like, ‘oh no, it’s the end of the world’.
“But i t ’s a n e w group trying to get to know each other and trying to play a new brand of football. So you have to keep your head down, keep working hard, keep believing in what we’re doing.”
Had Ireland got the result their performance deserved in the Euro play-off in Slovakia last month, the narrative could be totally different.
As it is, they are scrambling for a positive result of any kind now.
“It’s brilliant to be able to look back at what ifs, if that shot went in or if I saved this penalty or whatever else,” said the experienced keeper. “But unfortunately it didn’t happen. We weren’t going to get probably as easy a chance to qualify as that Slovakia game, but it’s been and gone.
“We played well, we created the chances, we just didn’t put the game to bed. Hopefully it’s still one that hurts people and it’s an experience for people to learn from going forward.”
Randolph says it is vital now the squad’s established figures put an arm around their younger colleagues and accentuate the positives.
“You have to,” he said. “There are new or younger faces coming in over this changeover period.
“It ’s p r o b a b ly down to us to keep morale after nights like Thursday going into a game like Sunday.
“At one stage we were the younger ones coming into the Irish set-up with other senior players who held our hands along the way.
“That’s what we’re going to need to do with the younger boys.
“They ’re a confident bunch . They’ve obviously played under the manager, they know how he wants to play. They all want the ball, none of them are shy – which is a good thing for trying to change the way that we want to play.”