Ireland are on the right path but it’s a very rocky road

WE COULD ask the same question of the two teams at Hampden Park tonight.

Which is the real Ireland? Which is the real Scotland?

We saw Ireland thump the Scots 3-0 at the Aviva in June but, a week earlier, they lost to Armenia.

After that grim defeat in Yerevan, Stephen Kenny talked of his surprise at the home side switching to five at the back.

Kenny mentioned in passing that, in the build-up to the tie, they’d studied Armenia’s previous 20 matches and, bar one occasion, always played with four defenders.

It was a telling moment because it reminded us that we aren’t in Kansas anymore. Brian Kerr is the only other Ireland manager who would ever have thought of watching 20 Armenia games. But Armenia still won. After they went ahead on 74 minutes, Ireland had just one real attempt on goal — a John Egan header.

Crosses

Ireland produced 34 crosses in Yerevan, and precious little came off them. The three games where Ireland have dominated possession to the greatest extent under Kenny — at home to Luxembourg and Azerbaijan, and away to Armenia — have resulted in two defeats and a draw. No other Ireland manager has lost to two teams ranked outside the top 90 in the world.

That’s one aspect to this Ireland team, the other is the stirring performances we’ve seen against the likes of Portugal, Ukraine and Scotland.

I’m firmly of the belief that Kenny has the squad on the right path, but it’s a rocky road — good title for a book, that...

Indeed, it’s often the case with teams full of young players that there are inconsistent performances.

We also have to factor in the fact that this is the first international since June, and it’s been a difficult start to the club season for a fair few Irish players.

We don’t really know in advance whether they will have momentum from the win over the Scots last time out.

As for the home team, which is the real Scotland?

I watched them beat Ukraine 3-0 on Wednesday night on Virgin TV and was baffled by how positive Brian Kerr and Richard Dunne were about the Scots afterwards.

They were on analysis duty for Virgin and both were full of praise for Steve Clarke’s men.

The reality is that they were very ordinary for long periods of the game.

In the first half, I thought Scotland were desperately poor and, though they had a couple of chances before John McGinn’s opening goal, they looked toothless.

Headers

McGinn took his goal well but the other two — headers from Lyndon Dykes — were greatly helped by really poor defending.

As the game went on, Ukraine just seemed to tune out. They weren’t on it at all. It became a training stroll for Scotland in the last 20 minutes.

So I’d take the result with a large pinch of salt.