Paul Fennessy reports from the Aviva Stadium

IRELAND INTERNATIONAL JAMIE McGrath was already on holiday when he received a late call-up to play in Ireland’s matches with Qatar and Canada.

The Hibernian star has had limited opportunities under Heimir Hallgrímsson, with his last appearance before tonight coming in the October 2024 2-1 Nations League win away to Finland, so he was determined to grasp the chance regardless of the circumstances.

“I was actually on holiday Sunday night when the gaffer rang me to come in Monday,” McGrath told reporters. “I only landed about an hour, and just went out for dinner, and I had a nice call from the gaffer.

“Once I spoke to him, we have a great relationship; he’s brought me in loads of times before, and it was a no-brainer

“I won’t [not] come in unless my leg is hanging off, and it was a quick turnaround, and had other holidays planned this week with my girlfriend, actually, who traveled to Nashville today on her own with two of our mates, so she was trying to get Wi-Fi on the plane to watch it today.

“You have 30 years when you retire to go on holiday. I’m just delighted to get the nod, and I have a great relationship with the gaffer, and he was quite clear, and yeah, it was delightful.”

The 29-year-old was in Marbella, Malaga, when he got the news.

“I was obviously over the moon, [my girlfriend] was over the moon as well. Everybody’s over the moon. I just had to tell her I won’t be on the flight on Thursday, we had a busy summer planned when I found out.”

And was McGrath not tempted to keep his phone turned off after another long, hard season?

“I’d never do that. It’s your country at the end of the day. I’m a proud Irishman and I’d never reject a call-up.

“We were meant to go [to Nashville] for two weeks. We have to do a bit of rearranging. I think her and my dad might fly over to Montreal [for the Canada game] now. We’ll probably fly away after, so we’ve loads of time. It’s not a big deal.”

The Dubliner also addressed the tennis ball protest that took place during tonight’s game.

“Everybody has a right to voice their opinion as long as it’s done in a safe way, we don’t mind. Obviously, it was a stop-start game; it hit a bit of a lull after that, but people have their own opinion, and it’s one of those things. I’ve never really been in this situation before, so it’s all a learning curve to me. As long as it’s done in the right way, we’re fine with it.

“I think Séamus spoke really well about it the other day. We don’t all agree with what’s going on. Ideally, it’s not in our hands. We don’t know what’s going to happen as the build-up to the game; there are a lot of permutations that could happen. But it’s not a nice situation to be put into. Personally, none of us agree with what’s going on.”

And on a personal level, would McGrath consider opting out of the Israel games?

“I’m in and out of the squad. I don’t know if that decision will come or not, I’ll have to obviously have a chat with my family because at the end of the day it’s my people, but it’s a long way away now, we’ll see when it comes around.”