Slovenia can still provide springboard for Strachan, insists O’Neill
AS Michael O’Neill points out, it would take something ‘dramatic’ to turn round Scotland’s World Cup prospects. Yet as an expert in the art of qualifying for an international tournament and a man well versed in how Gordon Strachan goes about his business, he insists it would be folly to write off the campaign ahead of tonight’s game with Slovenia.
O’Neill guided Northern Ireland to Euro 2016, their first major tournament in 30 years, but his journey to France was borne of a lengthy period of trial and error where he eventually devised a formula that still serves him well.
Appointed in late 2011, it took O’Neill 10 matches to secure his first victory. After his 18th, he still hadn’t achieved his second. Then, something clicked. A fine run of form saw them finish top of their qualifying section for last year’s finals where they reached the knockout stages.
Northern Ireland remain in the hunt for Russia 2018.
Strachan was given the Scotland job just over a year later than O’Neill but, after a promising first half to the Euro campaign, his team has regressed alarmingly.
Failure to make the play-offs for France gave way to a negative mindset in which the coach spoke of his team playing ‘scared football’.
The narrative has continued through failure to beat Group F rivals Lithuania, Slovakia and England to the point where his job surely depends on getting a result against Slovenia at Hampden tonight.
O’Neill acknowledges the pivotal nature of the fixture but he believes it could just as easily prove a launchpad to success as the point of no return for the manager.
‘I think Scotland have been unlucky,’ he states. ‘There is such a fine balance in international football in terms of where you are in the group.
‘If Scotland can get three points against Slovenia then that would give them seven points from five games and bring them right back into it.
‘They might need to have a really strong second half to the campaign but Gordon will know that. I think this is a big game — win and you will get some momentum again and that’s a big thing. They have England coming to Hampden in June as well, so it can change very dramatically.’
Northern Ireland reached the Euros by edging out Romania, the team which inflicted their one qualifying defeat in Bucharest. They bounced back from that reverse by beating Finland in their fifth qualifier, a result that O’Neill feels was the most important in the 10-game programme.
Losses against Slovakia and England mean Scotland’s hopes of automatic qualification have already evaporated but win tonight and O’Neill argues that the prospect of making the play-offs becomes real. Slovenia sit second in the table but a Hampden win would take Scotland to within a point of them.
The problem for Scotland and Strachan is that, in the minds of many fans, the campaign was done by matchday three when Slovakia inflicted a 3-0 defeat in Trnava, a brutal loss that came just days after a last-minute James McArthur goal rescued a home point against Lithuania.
The bad taste of that October double-header lingers but O’Neill believes a win tonight would cleanse the palate of the Tartan Army.
‘I look at our situation and game five was the most important in terms of us qualifying for the Euros,’ he continues. ‘When you come back after a few months off it is almost like starting again. Scotland could win five of their last six games — it will be very difficult but it isn’t impossible.
‘I think the Slovenia game, especially as it is at home, gives Gordon the chance to get some momentum going. I’d love to have seen Scotland reach France and to gather momentum to get to Russia.
‘It is very difficult at international level because you build the team for five days and hope you win, then the players disappear and you have to build another team for another five days.
‘But I played under Gordon and I know how good he is, how he works. If you can get some momentum, everything seems to be more positive. The fans are positive and so are the media — you need that groundswell. This match is a chance to re-establish that.’
The build-up, blackened further by the dismal showing in the warm-up against Canada in midweek, has been distinctly subdued, yet O’Neill refuses to subscribe to the pessimism that can act as a pollutant in the Scottish game.
O’Neill represented Dundee United and Hibernian before playing under Strachan at Coventry. He has retained a home in Edinburgh, keeping him in close contact with the SPFL scene.
Strachan has seemed disinclined to select homegrown players where there is an alternative in the English second tier but O’Neill sees the Ladbrokes Premiership as offering no impediment to international progress.
‘Our players have done well from playing up here,’ he said. ‘Niall McGinn and Lee Hodson have been regulars and Aaron Hughes is now at Hearts, too. Someone like Josh Magennis got a move down to Charlton on the back of his success here with Kilmarnock.
‘The players have to raise their levels when they play international football but the boys playing in Scotland have always done well for us.
‘The main thing is that they are playing regularly. Everyone would love to have 20 players playing in the English Premier League but I don’t have that luxury — and neither does Gordon Strachan.’
They might need a really strong second half to the campaign, which Gordon realises