KENNY BOOST
Irish boss gets Chelsea coach to replace Duff
STEPHEN KENNY has completed his back-room team in the nick of time for next month’s World Cup qualifiers by adding Anthony Barry to the coaching ticket as replacement for Damien Duff.
While Duff won two Premier League titles at Chelsea, Barry is Chelsea’s first team coach, having been head-hunted by Frank Lampard last summer from Wigan.
He survived Lampard’s sacking and is working under Thomas Tuchel, unbeaten in eight games as manager ahead of tomorrow’s visit of Manchester United.
Barry, 34, has strong ties to fellow Scouser Paul Cook, the former Sligo Rovers manager. The pair played together at Accrington Stanley in 2005-06, while he was also Cook’s coach at Wigan Athletic from 2017 until 2020.
Barry impressed Lampard when they completed their UEFA Pro Licence coaching badges last summer and he left for Chelsea three weeks after Cook resigned last August. Kenny names his
squad on March 18 for the games against Serbia, Luxembourg and Qatar. Ireland will also have a training camp, and two friendlies, in Europe in the summer. FAI CEO Jonathan Hill expressed the association’s regret at the fall-out from ‘Wembley-gate’ (Kenny’s use of a patriotic prematch video and speech before the friendly loss to England and Wembley), which contributed to
Duff’s departure from the assistant coach role last month. ‘I suspect all of us would rather none of it happened,’ he said yesterday. He revealed that Duff had a number of ‘frustrations’ during his time as coach before he quit. Hill has yet to speak to Robbie Keane, who remains on the FAI pay-roll but hasn’t worked since last April. As the CEO is due to move to Dublin next month, he can meet Keane in person. Hill confirmed that the four scheduled Euro 2020 games in Dublin will only go ahead in the Aviva Stadium if fans are permitted to attend. ‘UEFA wants to see fans in all 12 of the stadia. We are planning on the basis we will have fans in the Aviva Stadium,’ he said. If visiting fans from Poland, Sweden and Slovakia cannot attend, Hill understands that UEFA will allow Irish fans to take their place at the Aviva, pending NPHET approval. ‘In early April UEFA will take its decisions. We are committed to the hosting of our four games and we will have fans in the stadium. It’s just a question of how many,’ he said. Hill insisted the FAI was committed to ‘a credible’ bid for the 2030 World Cup finals alongside the other home nations.