Mark Noble tests the limit of our 'Granny-Rule' tolerance

A week on from the announcement of Martin O'Neill's first competitive Irish squad, the major controversies (as always) have centred around those in absentia. At first glance, there were no real surprises in the extended panel; having named thirty-six players, O'Neill left little room for controversy, naming a number of players who have not yet featured significantly under the new manager, such as Darron Gibson, Andy Reid and Joey O'Brien. Such an inclusive strategy should ensure that every player is aware that they are in the manager's thoughts. There will be no crude alienation of talent - a welcome contrast from the previous regime.

In the last number of days, the eligibility and commitment of two English-born players - Jack Grealish and Mark Noble - has come under scrutiny. Despite representing Ireland all the way through the youth ranks, Grealish - a promising young Aston Villa midfielder - has opened up the possibility of defection in the future by asking not to be included in the senior squad. Such a move by Ireland would, admittedly, be slightly cynical - capping him for five minutes against Georgia would tie him to Ireland for life. As an eighteen-year-old dual-national, he is entitled to take his time, and will continue to represent Ireland at U-21 level for the foreseeable future. If he eventually switches (players can only switch associations once), it will be a loss - but it's a personal choice, and good luck to him in whatever he decides. He could - as England's interest suggests - turn out to be another Ross Barkley; a young star with a big future. He could, alternatively, follow the likes of Conor Henderson and Conor Clifford into the well-trodden Irish quagmire of lower-league mediocrity. Only time will tell.

Mark Noble comes at the other end of the dual-nationality scale - a player who had expressed no interest in playing for Ireland, but is seemingly now keen on declaring, at twenty-seven. This revelation has (rather conveniently) come after his omission from England's latest competitive squad. The West Ham midfielder would have been confident of breaking into Hodgson's panel, given the retirements of Gerrard, Lampard and Carrick - however, it was not to be, and according to some sources, he could be eligible in time for the Germany game. It's a curious development, and one which will polarise opinion. Our shameless exploitation of the Granny Rule has benefited Ireland before, given the wide reach of our diaspora - where would we be without the goals and influence of Houghton, Aldridge, Townsend, Cascarino, Holland and, of course, McAteer? Happy memories notwithstanding, it has often left the Irish team with a confused melange of accents, identities and backgrounds, and an ambiguous relationship between the already-vague concept of 'Irishness' and the soccer team that represents this nation. The FAI - Find An Irishman barbs from the Charlton era are still tiresome. Even in the modern day, it is naive to think that the likes of McCarthy, McGeady, Pilkington and Westwood would have declared for Ireland had they been approached first by their native associations.

From a footballing point of view, Noble would be an asset - but only if he worked his way into the team on merit, brought his 'A' game, bought into the spirit of the Irish team, and truly embraced the privilege of playing international football, as the likes of Houghton, Aldridge et al have done. He's a good player, and has more experience and top-flight pedigree than any of our other midfielders. He would provide a much-needed goal-threat and a bit of physicality - which would be ideal alongside McCarthy. All of our other central midfield options have question-marks hanging over them. Gibson has a history of being a bit lazy/overwhelmed at this level, and is not likely to nail down a starting place with Everton. Reid isn't getting any younger. Hendrick is still unproven. Meyler is a very mixed bag - he's very physical and abrasive, but his passing can vary between impeccable and wayward. Then, of course, there's Whelan... All of them bar the latter have possible upsides (Gibson and Hendrick being potentially more talented than our mooted Anglo recruit), but Noble would be the neutral's choice, on ability, age profile, and top-level experience.

So, in theory, taking emotion out of the equation, Noble would seem to fit the bill perfectly.

However, I think we all want to see this new Irish team, under O'Neill, not just getting results, but playing with a character that Irish fans and public can get behind and identify with - a team of players who truly value playing football for their country. We want to see a team that plays with the kind of intensity, pace and aggression that we saw from O'Neill's Celtic team in the big European nights. Having a 'Saaarf Laaandan' mercenary at the heart of it, someone who has rejected and dismissed us before, who was nowhere to be found when we actually needed a player like him five years ago after Steven Reid broke down... it just does not fit in with any desirable vision for this Irish team.

However, such visions may just be utopian. Irish football is in the doldrums, and qualification for Euro 2016 is vital, in terms of maintaining interest and enthusiasm for the national team, and soccer in general in this country. The FAI's coffers are also in need of the sponsorship and TV money that qualification would bring. To qualify, we need the best possible players available, and unlike other Granny-Rule hopefuls like Richard Stearman and David McGoldrick, Noble would potentially improve the Irish team. It may well, in time, prove to be a necessary evil.

Some encouraging signs, but plenty of work for O'Neill.

With twenty-seven different players used in varying formations, and at least ten squad regulars absent through injury, it is difficult to gain any real insight, nor draw too many conclusions, from Ireland’s summer friendlies. The results have not inspired much confidence, and very few of the fringe players emerged with full credit. The clear positives from the Italian game in Craven Cottage were somewhat mitigated by a 5-1 thrashing against Portugal - another blot on the record books for a bedraggled and decimated Irish squad.

The game against Turkey was a drab affair; a typical end-of-season kickaround, with little urgency or enthusiasm on show from either team. Italy provided a more entertaining contest in London, with Ireland employing a high-pressing game which rattled their more seasoned opponents. The Italian side may have been experimental, with fringe players auditioning for a World Cup squad place, but Prandelli's team still boasted more reputable talent and pedigree than any side we will play in Euro 2016 qualification, bar Germany. Ireland’s performance was encouraging. David Meyler and Jeff Hendrick were able combatants in midfield, using their athleticism to press and harry the Italians - but they were also technically proficient enough to move the ball with more precision and adventure than we have seen from an Irish midfield in some time. Such mobility and passing ability was a huge contrast from the stodgy performances of Whelan and Wilson against Turkey, and both players should be relegated to the status of emergency back-up in central midfield. Stephen Quinn hit the bar late on, a chance missed to claim a significant scalp. 

With the likes of O’Shea and Coleman being excused from the USA tour, and Dunne, St. Ledger, O’Brien, Delaney and Clark also in absentia, the Irish defence had a slipshod look in the Costa Rica and Portugal games. Stephen Kelly won a few more caps, giving absolutely no reason why he should add any more. Richard Keogh also struggled in the two games, with Stephen Ward returning for the Portugal game to catastrophic effect. Though Shane Duffy did little wrong on his long-awaited début, Ireland looked genuinely atrocious in defence, and parts of the US tour were as bad as any performance we have seen from Ireland under Staunton or Trapattoni. The Italian, for all his flaws, realised that defending as a team was a good starting point for an international side – O’Neill and Keane still need to implement a defensive system that all players can adequately adhere to.

O’Neill and Keane will have learned from the four games – particularly with regard to the areas that need strengthening, and the players who are simply not up to international football. Defence is a worry, and with Wilson hopefully restored to left-back instead of the hapless Ward, and Coleman indispensable at right-back, an effective centre-back partnership still needs to be settled upon. O’Shea ended the season strongly for Sunderland, and will be first-choice. If Dunne starts the season well for QPR, he will rightly be in the frame, despite his advancing age - 35 in September. If St. Ledger finds a club of any decent standing, his experience will be useful, while Joey O’Brien can not be ignored if fit. Ciaran Clark has a lot to do, particularly with the arrival of Senderos at Aston Villa, but he remains one of precious few youthful options. Certainly, neither Pearce nor Keogh gave any reason in the friendlies to be considered above the more experienced incumbents, but there are a lot of ‘if’s about Ireland’s defensive options going into the new campaign. Paul McShane can probably feel confident about regaining his place in the squad in the autumn.

Though Meyler and Hendrick were good in parts, McCarthy and Gibson should start in the autumn, while Whelan and Green’s jittery performances against Costa Rica should see them slip down the pecking order. Both Gibson and Robbie Brady will hope to hit the ground running in the Oman game, as it will be their only chance to stake a claim for the starting XI before Georgia. A fit Brady would add set-piece ability and a goal threat from midfield, both badly needed. McGeady was his usual self against Italy, both dazzling and frustrating in equal measure, while McClean – despite his well-taken goal against Portugal – is still too one-dimensional and one-footed to instil confidence – something of a Kilbane-lite. Pilkington showed against Italy that he has plenty of ability, but needs to maintain consistency. With Stephen Quinn also providing a wide option, the wing is not necessarily a problem area, but goals are an issue for this team, and Brady seems the most likely player to step up and shoulder that responsibility.

The forward options are a significant worry, given the lack of goals of late. If O’Neill is to persist with a 4-5-1 formation, it is safe to assume Hoolahan will operate in the hole behind the striker – perhaps with a fit Andy Reid, Brady or Stephen Quinn providing backup. While he must now be an automatic starter, Hoolahan will need to find a decent club in the summer. Long-time admirers Aston Villa would be a good fit – otherwise, the Championship beckons, and at 32, his departure from top-tier football would surely be a one-way trip. The club careers of Stephen Hunt, Kevin Doyle and Andy Reid have never really recovered from dropping out of the top tier, and the Dubliner will need his agent to work hard this summer.

Up top, Shane Long simply needs to start scoring goals. Everything else is in place – he is fast, mobile, strong and combative, and capable of getting into good positions – finishing is the one exasperating chink in his armour. If a suitable cloning device were available to infuse Long’s positive attributes with Keane’s sniping instinct, Ireland would have a genuine top-class striker. Keane may start against Georgia, and it would certainly not be a travesty; however, there is a worry that he is living on borrowed time as an international striker. He was a passenger for long periods against Costa Rica, a missed penalty the only noteworthy contribution, and one fears that his time in the MLS could be blunting his instincts at a higher level (though it must be said, it hasn’t done Tim Cahill any harm). Doyle scored in the Costa Rica game, and should he find his goalscoring touch for a Championship club or better, he will remain an option; at 31, there is another effective campaign in him. Despite a fine finish as a sub against Turkey, Jon Walters was poor against Portugal, and his goalscoring record at club level is abysmal. Anthony Stokes could feel aggrieved for not getting more game-time alongside Hoolahan, as he is arguably the next most natural goalscorer after Keane, but you suspect that he will need to leave the SPL before his credentials are recognised.

In terms of formation, O’Neill deployed the old 4-4-2 against Costa Rica, to near-disastrous effect, proving its redundancy as a formation against any decent standard of opposition. The more flexible 4-5-1, with the high-pressing midfield tactic from the Italian game, will probably be in effect in Tbilisi. Judging on O’Neill’s selections to date, Forde should retain his place in goal, while O’Shea, Coleman and Wilson are nailed-on starters in defence. McCarthy and McGeady will start in midfield, with Gibson, Meyler, Hendrick, Brady, Pilkington and McClean fighting it out for the remaining positions. Hoolahan should start behind either Keane or Long. It is hardly a vintage Irish crop, but if their potential is harnessed, there is more than enough to be competitive in this group.

O’Neill is known as an outstanding motivator when the big day arrives, and should now know the futility of judging players solely on friendly performances in front of apathetic audiences, when players have other things on their minds. However, it takes a giant leap of faith to assume that the manager will magically coax the best out of this squad, and elevate the team’s performance to the fired-up intensity of, say, Celtic in the fondly-remembered European nights of the early 2000s. Friendlies are notoriously difficult to quantify; Brian Kerr had a superb non-competitive record, but his teams often seemed paralysed in big games against beatable opposition. Our magnificent 2002 World Cup campaign was preceded by home defeats to Greece and Scotland. Even Steve Staunton managed a 4-0 win away to Denmark before the death-throes of his horrific reign. We have but few scraps of evidence to go on. On the positive side, O’Neill’s selections have generally been without controversy. No-one has been neglected nor treated unfairly, and the players have generally been picked in suitable positions. However, the defensive system clearly needs fine-tuning, and O’Neill needs to be ruthless with certain players who have failed to take their chances. Not naming names, but we should not be selecting left-backs who are unable to defend, nor midfielders who lack the mobility or technique to play a high-pressing, fast-paced game.

The Italy game provided the most encouraging signs, but the age profile of our first-choice defensive options, lack of emerging talent in many areas, and the lack of a reliable alternative to Robbie Keane, are issues that O’Neill can do little about. The Portugal game really exposed Ireland’s vulnerability when shorn of key players in defence, and the fragile confidence of our more seasoned players, who are now sadly accustomed to bad beatings against the better sides. Though the midfield – so poor under Trapattoni – is on the way to being a more fluid and effective area, O’Neill’s biggest challenges will be to fix Ireland’s losing psychology, blunt attack and slipshod defending – jobs that, thus far, remain undone.

Summer Friendlies - Preview

With four months remaining until Ireland's first European Championship qualifier, Ireland's upcoming friendly fixtures against Turkey, Italy, Costa Rica and Portugal could be hugely significant in the tactical evolution of Martin O'Neill's Irish team. In the three friendly games to date, O'Neill has deployed a wide range of players, and utilised a number of refreshing tactical variations. However, a clear game-plan needs to be implemented over the next month - one that effectively harnesses the talents of the available players.

Looking at the list of absentees to date, it is worrying that Darron Gibson, Robbie Brady and Joey O'Brien will not get a chance to establish themselves in the preferred starting eleven. Brady has an outside chance of making it, but even if he appears in the squad for Hull in the FA Cup final, Steve Bruce may not be amenable to the prospect of his player going on an end-of-season tour after missing six months of football. Gibson is in the same boat at Everton; while he has returned to full training after his cruciate ligament injury, it appears, understandably, that Martinez would prefer the midfielder to rest until pre-season. While both players should be fit to return in the new season, their absence - along with that of Andy Reid - may discourage O'Neill from picking them in the qualifiers.

O'Brien's absence has invited scrutiny over his commitment to Ireland's cause, but it must be remembered that he only made nineteen appearances this season, owing to recurring injuries and persistent knee pain. Looking at the age profile amongst Ireland's defenders, the 28-year-old O'Brien would undoubtedly be an asset, but O'Neill must plan without him. Of the other absentees, Richard Dunne has opted to rest after a long season, and Sean St. Ledger is seemingly out-of-favour, having featured very little for Leicester this season, before being released. Kieran Westwood will also miss out on a chance to put pressure on David Forde, in an area where Ireland are uncharacteristically weak at present.

There is enough talent available for Ireland to be competitive in the upcoming games. Coleman, O'Shea, Delaney, Wilson, McCarthy, Whelan, Meyler and Long have enjoyed regular first-team football in the EPL, and should form the backbone of the side. McGeady, Pilkington, Hoolahan, Clark and Quinn will be eager to make an impact after stop-start seasons in the top flight, and it will be interesting to see how the likes of Jeff Hendrick and Shane Duffy fare if they get any significant game-time.

There are a number of underwhelming selections, however. Conor Sammon is recalled after scoring two goals in thirty-eight Championship appearances, while Stephen Kelly makes it despite being out of favour at Reading. Stephen Ward deserves his call-up after a good season with Brighton, but his error-strewn performance against Serbia in March will have encouraged no-one about his ceiling for improvement. Unfortunately, once injuries are taken into account, there are few - if any - players who can be considered genuinely unlucky to be omitted. The squad is not a particularly young one - the average age is twenty-seven, and includes fifteen players who will be thirty or over by the time Euro 2016 rolls around, not including the injured Dunne, St. Ledger, O'Brien and Reid. O'Neill has lamented the dearth of younger prospects staking a claim, and it continues to be a worrying issue for fans and management alike.

Tactically, O'Neill has room to experiment. Thus far, he seems to have favoured a 4-4-1-1 formation, with an attacking player - generally Hoolahan - floating centrally behind a main striker. The glut of strikers - eight in total - in the current squad could indicate a return to a more orthodox 4-4-2 at some stage. Alternatively, the maligned Trapattoni ploy of playing Cox, Doyle and/or Walters out wide could be looked at again, which is not wholly encouraging. In his Sunderland days, Keane used Daryl Murphy and Anthony Stokes as wide players, to little or no positive effect; it would be a frustrating throwback if such a policy was undertaken by Ireland in the attacking third. We were never going to use such phrases as 'tiki taka' or 'false nines' in conjunction with the Irish team, but it would help matters if the more natural attacking midfielders - McGeady, McClean, Quinn, Hoolahan and Pilkington - were used properly, instead of misusing cumbersome central strikers in those positions on the basis of their finishing and aerial ability. O'Neill has never been afraid to play direct football, but there must be a mixture of bravery along with pragmatism in the attacking set-up. It is interesting to note that Germany - an outstanding exponent of effective attacking play - only have two orthodox central strikers in their current squad.

O'Neill must also consider the balance of youth and ability in defence. Marc Wilson has not been a qualified success as a footballing centre-half, and his ability may be better-suited to left-back, at Ward's expense. O'Shea, Delaney and Clark should compete for the centre-back positions, with Seamus Coleman obviously nailed-on at right-back. In central midfield, Glenn Whelan will probably retain his position alongside McCarthy, but David Meyler's physicality and box-to-box play would provide a welcome alternative.

With the scalps of Italy and Portugal to compete for, O'Neill looking to turn this squad into a cohesive unit, and Roy Keane overseeing training and preparation, there should be no excuse for players taking these games lightly. Many of the US tours under previous managers ended in farce; hopefully, this end-of-season series will be somewhat more productive in terms of developing an Irish team for the upcoming qualifiers.