MICK MULLS HIS OPTIONS
Squad has settled but left-back is still an issue
“Every side needs
a real wild card to get over the line”
AS a boyhood Leeds United fan, Mick McCarthy marvelled at how Billy Bremner and Johnny Giles, two men small in stature but huge in heart, rarely lost a midfield scrap at Elland Road.
In Josh Cullen, McCarthy sees shades of the Leeds legends.
‘I haven’t got reservations about Josh’s size because he is technically very good and a tough little sod,’ said McCarthy after Cullen’s classy contribution to Tuesday’s 3-1 win over Bulgaria.
‘He puts his foot in and stands his ground. You wouldn’t think he’s a little fella that gets knocked around.
‘He handles the ball well. He’s got good legs and gets around the pitch.
‘Not particularly good at marking at corners and free kicks but sometimes you’ve got to put up with that to get the bigger players in those areas.
‘Billy Bremner and Johnny Giles weren’t big either but not much got past them.’
For Tuesday’s Euro 2020 trial, Cullen was the big winner as he got through 90 minutes with a lung-bursting shift.
Yet to play a competitive minute for Ireland, the Londoner is a cert to figure in McCarthy’s squad for the double-header against Georgia and Switzerland next month.
With two games in three days and a long-haul flight in between, McCarthy knows he can’t rely on the triumvirate of Whelan-Hendrick-Hourihane to complete 180 minutes unscathed.
‘They are both possession-based teams and if we want to go and press them, we’ll have to have energy on the pitch,’ he said.
The Ireland boss needs options and Cullen, a regular for Championship club Charlton, where he is on loan from West Ham, has moved up the pecking order in the Euro game plan.
So too has Preston’s Alan Browne, whose mobility and nose for a goal, offers a different option in the trenches for McCarthy.
While things could change between now and the October 1 squad announcement, Cullen and Browne are ahead of James McCarthy and Harry Arter in the midfield rankings.
McCarthy is done with naming 40-strong provisional squads and will stand by around 25-26 elite stormtroopers for the trips to Tbilisi and Geneva.
Most of that number he would reel off without drawing breath as he will stay loyal to those who have put Ireland in a promising position in Group D — nine players have started every qualifier so far.
But there will be one or two gaps that need filling and Jack Byrne is one who could provide them after an outstanding 30-minute cameo on his senior debut.
Ok, it was a friendly against an ordinary Bulgarian side who were starting to tire but Byrne picked them off like a sniper with some sublime passes in the final third.
Ordered to push upfield and link play with the forward players, the Shamrock Rovers schemer did what it said on the tin and was involved in two late goals as Ireland again finished strongly
Another eye catcher was James Collins who needed less than half an hour to score on his debut, becoming the first player to do so since Graham Burke of Rovers against the USA in June 2018.
A late debutant at 28, Collins is ‘nailed on’ to stay in McCarthy’s squad after seizing his moment
in a way Scott Hogan has struggled to do.
‘Maybe the game got stretched but he came on and made a difference.
‘I’ve heard him say it’s his chance, that he’s 28, he’s done the hard yards in the lower leagues.’
‘He was a bit of a journeyman I guess but he’s found his home at Luton and he’s continued to do it, he showed that he’s very capable.
‘It’s where he ran for the goal, which he helped set up — he knows where to go and how to get goals. It doesn’t matter if you are playing non-league or Premier League.’
‘He was technically good, too, especially with one ball that dropped down out of the sky, which he got control of.’
Through Cullen, Browne, Byrne and Collins, the manager knows he has options he can turn to next month, but solving the left-back vacancy remains a riddle.
McCarthy picked Aston Villa midfielder Conor Hourihane there on Tuesday as he felt he needed an hour or so of game time, no more.
With Enda Stevens suspended, the options are not so obvious. Matt Doherty, if fit, and Cyrus Christie are right-backs and McCarthy is not keen on round pegs in square holes.
James McClean remains a definite option as he is left-footed and has played there.
Alternatively, Greg Cunningham of Blackburn Rovers or veteran Stephen Ward, a team-mate of McClean’s at Stoke, might be considered.
A long shot might be the leftfooted Ciaran Clark, were he to return to the Newcastle United team. Magpies boss Steve Bruce is a big friend of McCarthy and might get a telephone call in the coming days.
The bulk of the first XI should pick itself for Georgia, where a win would put the squeeze on the top two seeds Switzerland and Denmark.
As for the back-up boys, some will be needed more than most over the final three qualifiers, and teenager Troy Parrott of Spurs may yet be among them.
In any tight qualification, every team needs a wild card, a late bolter, to help get them over the line. MY SQUAD FOR GEORGIA AND SWITZERLAND: Goalkeepers: Randolph, Travers, O’Hara. Defenders: Coleman, Stevens, Doherty, Duffy, Keogh, K Long, Egan, Cunningham. Midfielders: Whelan, Hendrick, Hourihane, Cullen, Browne, Byrne, Judge, McClean, O’Dowda, Curtis. Forwards: McGoldrick, Robinson, Maguire, Collins, Parrott.