Macphee helps pen another Northern Irish success story

● Coach believes Hearts can benefit from ongoing march of O’neill’s team

Northern Ireland’s rise to their current status of 23 has been one of the football stories of recent times. It is also one imbued with a very Scottish flavour. O’neill and assistants Macphee and Jimmy Nicholl flew home to Scotland on the same flight yesterday.

O’neill is based in Edinburgh, Macphee in Fife, from where he commutes to carry out his Hearts duties, and Nicholl is domiciled near Stirling.

Also on board the plane to Edinburgh from Belfast were Hearts players Kyle Lafferty, Aaron Hughes and Michael Smith, as was Rangers fullback Lee Hodson. All except Smith had played their part in the previous night’s 2-0 win over Czech Republic that secured second spot in Group C for Northern Ireland.

“If you look at the team that finished the game last night, Michael Mcgovern was in goal – who a year and a half ago was in the SPFL at Hamilton,” says Macphee. “Hodson of Rangers was at right wing back, Hughes was at centrehalf, Josh Magennis wide right, Kyle up front and Niall Mcginn, recently at Aberdeen, was on the wing.”

Of course, there remains a possibility that Macphee, a Fifer, could come up against

0 Michael O’neill celebrates with Steve Davis after Northern Ireland secured second spot in Group C. Scotland in the play-offs. “I would be disappointed if that happened,” he says. “You want both countries to get there and that would mean it was not possible. I’d feel a lot more comfortable being in the same group in Russia than meeting in a play-off.”

Northern Ireland stand a chance of being seeded so it could be a one in four chance of the countries being drawn together – providing Scotland can also secure a place in the play-offs. After their recent heroics Northern Ireland would surely have to start favourites.

“The biggest benefit for a smaller nation being at a major finals is we had 44 days together,” says Macphee, recalling reaching the last 16 at Euro 2016. “That’s 44 days Scotland haven’t had. And an additional four or five games.

“As a consequence we are now in a scenario where we have coached the players more. They know us better, we know them better.”

Watching O’neill operate at close quarters is helping Macphee develop as a coach. He now realises it’s often as much about instinct as experience. “I listened to a really interesting talk by Walter Smith, he says. “He was talking about how people talk of needing experience to be a manager, whether it is playing experience or just managerial experience.

“He said one of the biggest things he learned is that experience does not always 0 Austin Macphee and Aaron Hughes toast win over Czechs. help you. Like last night for example we started off 4-2-3-1andthey[czechrepublic] played almost like a 3-4-3. Walter said sometimes experience makes you look back and think: ‘was there a game when I faced this before and what was my change?’

“Whereas if you are inexpe- rienced sometimes you trust your instinct more. Michael trusts his instinct a lot – and his instinct, during the time I have had with him, has been constantly proved correct, like when he changed six players against Ukraine in the second game of Euro 2016.

“That is not out of a coaching course or from experience.”

Macphee believes Hearts can similarly only benefit from Northern Ireland’s ongoing march, since, in addition to him, they provide three members of the playing squad.

“I think it helps the profile of the club a lot,” he says. “Just looking at the programme yesterday you see all the teams the players are from, the West Broms, Southamptons and then you see ‘Heart of Midlothian’ three times.

“Michael Smith was on the bench and Kyle came on and Aaron started,” he added. “Hopefully the Hearts supporters trust me, Aaron, Kyle and Michael a little more.

“We are doing something successfully at a higher level than Hearts. When we make decisions, whether it’s on the football pitch or at the club, they know it’s people working at a high level.” Queen of the South manager Gary Naysmith rued the Irn-bru Cup third-round draw that paired his side with Montrose – and not just because Stewart Petrie has turned the Gable Endies into a useful outfit.

The game at Links Park in October will see Queens play six out of seven matches away from their Dumfries home and Naysmith said: “To be honest we’d have liked a home draw.

“We have played Falkirk in the Championship away from home and then Berwick in the last round. We have Livingston away this weekend and then play Morton at Palmerston before going to St Mirren and Inverness in the league ahead of facing Montrose.

“That makes things a bit more difficult especially against a side that are on an upward curve under Stewart. They are sitting second in the league, won at Ayr in the last round so it is a tough tie for us.”

Elgin City are diving into the unknown for a second time in this season’s cup after being drawn away to Welsh side The New Saints.

The Borough Briggs men defeated Irish side Bray Wanderers on Saturday and assistant boss Gavin Price said: “It is another unusual game for us and we can only hope that we do as well as we did against Bray who are a top-tier side in the Republic of Ireland.”

Jim Mcinally is delighted his Peterhead side have a rare chance to play Inverness Caledonian Thistle. He said: “I’ve never come up against Inverness during my time in charge of Peterhead and I’ve been told the teams have only played each other once since they came into senior football.

“It is great for us to go to a big ground and face a big team but we have players that will enjoy that.”