STEPPING JONES

Northern Ireland’s fresh talent can’t fathom how far his stock has risen despite World Cup exit

NORTHERN Ireland new boy Jordan Jones salvaged some solace amid the debris and heartache of Sunday’s World Cup exit in Basel.

Eighteen months ago, the Kilmarnock winger faced a period of soul searching and a future without football after being released by hometown club Middlesbrough.

Yet here he was at a rainswept St Jakob Park, being thrown into the fray of a World Cup play-off as Michael O’neill chased a crucial leveller against the Swiss.

That O’neill would hand him his debut – as a 74th minute replacement for Jamie Ward – at such a pivotal moment will stay with Jones for a long time.

The fact he also came up against 96-times capped Juventus right-back Stephan Liechsteiner (below) merely added to the memory.

Jones, who reignited his career after joining Killie last year, said: “Once I came away from it and had time to think, I realised it was a big thing for the manager to put me on in that situation.

“It was probably the most important 15 minutes of his managerial career. He just said,

‘Go for it son’. For him to trust me like that makes me feel confident and good about myself.

“I didn’t know I was playing against the Juventus right-back.

I just thought, ‘Get the ball and go at him’. You’re trying to change the game and get a goal that would take us to a World Cup.

“It was devastating but I was proud to play coming from where I ’d been 18 months before.” The fact Northern Ireland fell agonisingly short in their quest to reach a first World Cup in a generation was a bitter pill for O’neill and his players.

Tougher still that a refereeing clanger in the first leg in Belfast gifted the Swiss their 1-0 aggregate win from a penalty that should never have been. Recounting the desolation and raw emotion in the away changing room in Basel, Jones said: “Absolute heartbreak is the best way to describe it.

“Grown men were crying, devastated that we weren’t going to the World Cup. We gave absolutely everything in the game and it was a very good performance.

“The manager said that in his speech after the game, how good the performance was and how proud he was of everyone. It does make it harder that we lost out by such a fine margin.” On Romanian referee Ovidiu Hategan’s penalty howler at Windsor Park, Jones said: “We feel as if we’ve been robbed out of a World Cup by a refereeing decision.

“At this level, you wouldn’t expect that kind of decision. I’ve looked back at the incident and not one player around it appealed. It looks even worse on telly than it did in real life.”

Jones believes the strong bond evident in the Northern Ireland squad is testament to O’neill who is now being strongly linked with the vacant Scotland job.

The 23-year-old, who received a first call-up to the senior squad last month, said: “You hear about team spirit and read about it in the papers but once you are there, you realise how close everybody is.

“That’s testament to the job he’s done. Everyone has so much respect for him and everybody in Northern Ireland wants him to stay as manager for as long as possible.”