Updated at 10.21
IT’S BOTH UNFORTUNATE and unfair that Glenn Whelan is often treated as the scapegoat for all of Irish football’s problems.
The invective levelled at Whelan following every disappointing result from fans on Twitter, comment threads and message boards is unparalleled.
Indeed, it’s difficult to think of another player in Irish football history so beloved by a series of managers yet routinely dismissed by fans.
Most Irish footballers who have played nearly 70 times for their country and made over 200 Premier League appearances tend to achieve near-legendary status, so why is Whelan not far off being reviled by many onlookers?
Let’s be clear — it’s far too simplistic to blame Whelan for last night’s disappointing 2-1 loss to Poland.
Granted, the 31-year-old midfielder did not play especially well at the Narodowy Stadium in Warsaw, but it was not Whelan’s fault that Richard Keogh missed a gilt-edged chance with a header. It was not Whelan’s fault that Ireland were so consistently poor at delivering set pieces. And it was not Whelan’s fault that Poland happened to have the best striker in the world on current form playing in their team.
Moreover, Ireland competed for 37 minutes of play without Whelan, as Aiden McGeady replaced the experienced international just before the hour mark. The Boys in Green hardly improved immeasurably when the Stoke man left the action.
Yet do Irish football followers really hate Whelan, or is the issue more about what he has come to symbolise?
Although they rode their luck at times and conceded gargantuan levels of possession and territory, Ireland delivered what was surely their best performance in years as they beat world champions Germany 1-0 on Thursday night.
Yes, it was a deeply complacent German team, but there was an intelligence to the Irish display in their use of the ball in crucial situations and their ability to show composure in the most pressurised of circumstances — essentially, the very qualities that were strangely absent last night.
It was surely no coincidence then that Ireland’s best result in years coincided with their most adventurous team selection in recent memory. It’s hard to think of a more technically accomplished Irish midfield than McCarthy, Brady, Hendrick and Hoolahan since back in the days when players like Damien Duff and Roy Keane were at their peak.
On Thursday, Ireland picked a team to win the game — even though the opposition were technically superior and not to mention, the reigning world champions.
Last night, despite the team needing to win or, at the very least, score two goals, O’Neill looked as if he was setting up his side not to lose.
Yet Ireland’s problem in this qualification campaign has not been defending — they have conceded fewer goals that any other team in Group D.
In general, the Boys in Green have had serious trouble scoring — excluding matches against Gibraltar, they have not scored more than one goal in a competitive fixture since their opening qualifier over a year ago — a 2-1 victory against Georgia. Consequently, with this in mind and with Ireland needing to score at least once, it was a surprise when O’Neill started with three defensive midfielders in the side and a midfield workhorse of limited technical ability in James McClean.
Granted, the 63-year-old coach made the necessary attacking changes as the game wore on, but by that stage, panic had set in, and the long ball had virtually become a reflex for a team whose previously positive morale had suddenly been sapped. O’Neill’s men therefore began the game with the wrong mindset and struggled thereafter. It was a side being implicitly discouraged from playing football from the outset, with the selection suggesting as much.
Instead of asking, how can Ireland avoid losing games, should people not be asking what the team can do to win games? Ireland’s reputation as draw specialists in international football was not gained by accident. There is an in-built conservatism in every competitive game the side play. Thursday night was the exception — it hinted at what was possible if they shed this debilitating attitude.
Getting back to Whelan, perhaps he attracts such ire because his rise at international level has coincided with the most unspectacular period in Irish football since before the Charlton era. Without him against Germany, Ireland played with greater freedom, boldness and confidence (in both the home and away games).
It also seemed significant that James McCarthy had comfortably his best game in an Irish jersey last week, playing in the role normally occupied by the former Man City youth player in front of the defence. A full-blown Lampard-v-Gerrard-esque debate is threatening to develop with the Irish duo, and many are already suggesting they are too alike to play in the same team. Only, in contrast with the similarly talented English pair, McCarthy is clearly the superior player in this instance.
Whelan, of course, has been a fantastic servant for Ireland and deserves enormous respect for his achievements in the game, but perhaps it’s time for O’Neill to ditch the Stoke man and the conservative style with which he’s inextricably linked.
