A CURIOUS MOMENT arose yesterday, during Stephen Kenny’s latest engagement with the media at Abbottstown.
Having replaced one English coach, Anthony Barry, for another in John Eustace, Kenny was asked how and why his opinion of English coaches has changed since 2018, when he gave an interview after leading Dundalk to another league title lamenting Irish football’s limiting its view to England.
“People are institutionalised in the way they think and the ideology about the game”, said Kenny at the time. “I find it very frustrating, the narrow view people have. We’re too influenced by England. There are no English coaches, the best is Eddie Howe. The rest are old-school in the way they think and the way they play.”
When those quotes were read out to Kenny yesterday, he initially denied them, then claimed differing interpretations and then refused to discuss them. The press conference then moved on until Kenny returned to the question.
“I’m happy to clarify that”, he said. “At that time, I’m talking about head coaches who are managing teams playing in a progressive way. At that time, he [Howe] was the only one English manager in that division. It wasn’t a wholesale criticism of English coaches. Certainly, he was the only head coach of a team playing…..at that time. Now football changes so quickly, and it evolves quickly, and we’re all learning.
“There is a whole new raft of English coaches who have developed and are playing in a very progressive way now. At that time [end of 2018] when we looked at the Premier League, they [Bournemouth] were the only team playing in an expansive way, as a head coach. Where some of the other English coaches were more of a direct style. You couldn’t say that now. A lot of English coaches have emerged. It wasn’t an anti-English thing.
“It was a broader discussion at the time. You can’t just accept that into one point. It was about Dundalk, Europa League and all of that. It was a broader discussion in relation to how we played then.”
Among those English coaches is John Eustace. Kenny says he got to know him while travelling to games in England, particularly when scouting West Brom, as Eustace lives in Birmingham. “We would often meet there and have cups of tea and chats over the last year”, said Kenny. “I’ve seen him coaching at QPR and he has done well, so it just seemed, when I was working out who to bring in to replace Anthony, that he’d be a good candidate.
“My own relationship would be the main reason [he was recruited.] And his reputation as a good coach. I have had dealings with him through QPR as well on a professional level. He is an excellent addition to the team, a highly regarded coach and he will be a very good addition to the team.”
The due diligence went beyond chats over cups of tea: Kenny has reviewed footage of his training sessions at QPR.
“He has experience of managing senior pros at a club over that period of time and that kind of experience can be important as well”, added Kenny. “I think he’s a student of the game, he thinks about the game, we did quite a few video sessions together before he came onboard and we interacted in relation to how they train, what his ideas are, [discovering] do we connect on that level. He’s thought-provoking and he challenges some concepts, so he’s interesting and I feel that he’s a really good person as well, and he’ll bring a humility to the group. I think he’ll do a good job.”
Meanwhile, the Irish manager has yet to discover the rejigged plan for June’s Nations League games. Ireland were due to play four games – two of them against Ukraine – but their World Cup play-off against Scotland has been postponed and is likely to be played in June instead. One possibility will be to bring forward the home game with Armenia and play them twice in the June window.
“I’m not getting clear answers”, said Kenny. “You’d have to say it’s a possibility. We’re prepared to do it. Whatever it is, we’ll take it on. I’m not party to discussions with Uefa or Fifa.”
