A blessing in disguise as Kenny takes the reins

I had misgivings about Mick McCarthy's appointment from the beginning, as I articulated here in November 2018, and I do feel a pang of guilt right now. The global pandemic has given Ireland the manager it needs, at the unfortunate expense of a man who has served Irish football with genuine honesty, integrity and courage. At times over the past thirteen months, Ireland have played with a renewed sense of enthusiasm and grit, most evidently in the 1-1 draw away to Denmark. McCarthy brought something that was missing in the tortuous Nations League; his affable, positive nature providing a remedy for the toxicity of O'Neill and Keane's unnecessarily abrasive brand of man-management.

However, his reign was mostly a continuation of the conservatism we've seen from Irish managers since 2005. Brian Kerr had the Irish team playing passing football until he started policies of containment, which spectacularly backfired in two games against Israel. It was disappointing to see this great Irish football man, a developer of youth and practitioner of the beautiful game, end his tenure against Switzerland with John O'Shea and Kevin Kilbane in midfield, and the ball repeatedly launched towards the head of Gary Doherty. This tendency towards aimlessly direct, kick-and-rush football endured through the stylings of Staunton, Trapattoni, and O'Neill, with outbreaks of constructive, passing play (Slovakia in Croke Park in '07, Paris '09, Lille in '16) all-too-rare. One could label these tactics pragmatic if there seemed to be any semblance of effectiveness - too often, the ball has been hoofed in the general direction of a helpless striker with no support from midfield, and possession lost. Rinse and repeat, even against weaker opposition. We've had limited midfielders picking up cap after cap, despite looking utterly terrified of receiving the ball from their back four, and completely averse to making a forward pass. The talents of Andy Reid and Wes Hoolahan went under-used and unappreciated by successive managers, while we saw a conveyor belt of blundering, ineffective journeymen picked ahead of them.

McCarthy 2.0 was little more than a continuation of what went before. The games against tiny Gibraltar showed the Irish team in a disastrous light. The game by the Rock was close to being an all-time embarrassment, comparable to the 2-1 win over San Marino in 2007. At home, all Ireland could manage before the 89th minute was an own goal, despite starting with eight Premier League players. Ireland never looked like winning any of the games against Denmark or Switzerland, and the 0-0 draw away to Georgia was as turgid and inept as anything in the worst days of O'Neill, Trapattoni and Staunton. Ireland finished a limping 3rd in a three-horse race, and the campaign must go down as a failure. The accomplishment of a playoff, through the bizarre Nations League format, had been decided before McCarthy's appointment, and has nothing to do with his results.

A recurring grumble about McCarthy's management has been his reluctance to reward young, in-form players, and his dismissive attitude towards Aaron Connolly and Jayson Molumby doesn't fit with the man who gave Robbie Keane, Damien Duff and Richard Dunne their international debuts. There has been no move to address the glaring, debilitating weakness in Ireland's central midfield, with Glenn Whelan and Jeff Hendrick inexplicably keeping their places despite their passive, stand-off defending and laboured use of the ball. McCarthy has constantly regarded draws in winnable games as positive results - Georgia (ranked 91st in the world) being a prime example. Irish fans are sick of this negativity, and it's time for a complete change.

On to Stephen Kenny.

Since the possibility of his reign has come to light, some commentators have talked about McCarthy's 'experience and pedigree', urging caution about replacing him with a manager who is virtually unknown outside Ireland. This is a non-issue, in my opinion. McCarthy last managed in the Premier League in 2012, his contemporaries that season including Alex McLeish, Tony Pulis, Paul Lambert, Alan Pardew, Neil Warnock, and, of course, Martin O'Neill. Plenty of 'experience and pedigree' there. I doubt if any Irish fan with a working brain cell would be content to pick any of those names to manage our international side - they represent a dead era in football; redundant tactics, old-school motivational methods, an inability to adapt or move with the times. Michael O'Neill - plucked from Shamrock Rovers - has made Northern Ireland into a very competitive outfit. Despite the comparative modesty of their leagues, Sweden, Switzerland, Croatia and Denmark don't balk at the prospect of appointing a domestic-based coach to the national job. Neither should we.

Kenny puts faith in players, and trusts them to use the ball constructively in possession. We won't become a tiki-taka side, winning every game with delightful football. But at least we'll aspire to something better than mere blundering attrition. Plan A will not be Route One. The Under-21s have - for the first time in living memory - looked like a confident, accomplished and technically gifted side. They are our future, and Kenny has shown that he can get them playing to the best of their abilities, unlike his predecessors in the role. His Dundalk side were very competitive in the Europa League against much wealthier clubs, playing an attractive brand of football. He will not revert to the belief that Irish teams are congenitally inferior, and only capable of dragging teams down to 'our level'.

The game in Slovakia is now a shot to nothing. It's unlikely that McCarthy would have successfully negotiated it - the tactics would have been 'ten men behind the ball, try to nick something from a set-piece, or take it to penalties.' Kenny will, at least, show a different route forward, and it promises to be refreshing.