O’Neill needs to sell us a dream to cling to
“He replaced it with foods rich in vitamins, minerals, fibre contained in whole grains, fruit, vegetables, fish and olive oil,” Poser expanded, in the manner of a Brendan Rodgers detailing the half-time tactical ingenuity that would undo one of Liverpool’s opponents.
Two important ‘takeaways’, for me, from Dr Poser’s opportunism: The processed food enthusiasts among us will take solace, certainly, in recalling that Messi was able to play a bit back when he was presumably ingesting all manner of junk. A reminder too, if one was needed, that football invariably offers us many narratives from which to choose. And there’s usually one available to suit everyone’s agenda.
Martin O’Neill also attempted to tenuously work Messi into his narrative this week. Or at least the lack of Messi.
“You see the Champions League final there, where you know you have got three players capable of scoring a goal. It’s a lovely feeling to have when you’ve got world class players being able to take defences apart. If you haven’t got that, then you have to use other methods to try to win games.”
It would be unfair to make too much of the remarks, since O’Neill has made candid honesty a habit since he took the Ireland job. But in unpromising situations, honesty and the truth are no substitutes for a well-packaged narrative.
It probably wasn’t at Sunderland that Martin experienced those lovely feelings he talks about, in part because he forked out the guts of €40m on the impotent trident of Steven Fletcher, Adam Johnson and Danny Graham.
It is impossible not to recall one of Martin’s final gambits in the dog days at the Stadium of Light, when he noted, just before the end that: “We lack real true ability in the team.” With seemingly nothing left to offer the fans or the players, except the truth, O’Neill soon made way for the guarantee of bullshit Paolo di Canio brought.
That’s not to suggest we’re quite in the dog days yet with Ireland. O’Neill insists this evening’s qualifier with Scotland isn’t make or break for our Euro 2016 hopes, but it might be make or break for the narrative vacuum he has allowed develop around the Ireland team.
The truth about Ireland’s lack of players is not what we need to hear from Martin now. No doubt, these inescapable underlying conditions are a fertile basis to build a narrative on, as Giovanni Trapattoni showed. Trap never tired of telling us how unsound our fundamentals were in his pitch for austerity football.
But Martin hasn’t yet sold us convincing solutions. He hasn’t attempted to offer us a project, a four-year-plan, or even a philosophy. He doesn’t really talk about his “other methods”. He won’t explain to us how “the group are moving forward together”.
For all of this he deserves, on one hand, enormous admiration and respect. But there are dangers too in foregoing the intoxicating power of bullshit.
After many years of reflecting morosely on their lack of players, Gordon Strachan’s Scotland have taken a different approach.
Certainly Strachan is allowing them play with a bit of freedom. But in case nobody notices, the camp has consistently hammered home the philosophy shift.
“We wanted to bring a more international, European and sophisticated type of football with more movement and variety,” Strachan’s number two Mark McGhee told us a few months ago.
“I train and laugh with real good players. I don’t think life gets much better,” said Strachan this week, sentiment more in keeping with an era of regeneration that pressing your nose enviously against the Champions League windows.
“There seems to be a renaissance there, which is good for Scottish football,” contributed O’Neill, helpfully, to the feelgood effort, opting for honesty again.
If Scotland are talking themselves into recovery, the need for O’Neill to convince us he is working on a renaissance of his own has been offset so far by his prize asset, Roy Keane. As much as O’Neill assures us Keane is not a distraction, Keane has been a crucial one. The need to stitch together a convincing long-term narrative is less urgent, when you have Roy contributing compelling page-turning chapters every few weeks.
Some gaffers never get on top of the narrative. From the moment Steve Staunton introduced himself with his “I’m the boss, I’m the gaffer’ salvo, it was only a matter of time before he wouldn’t be trusted to drive the train to Cork. Brian Kerr traded on local-boy-made-good well-wishing a touch too long without giving us a convincing vision of where he was taking us.
Win, lose or draw tonight, Martin O’Neill needs to sell us something soon, even if it’s bullshit.
On my holidays last week, I was unavailable to supply professional outrage at the €5m we took from Sepp.
Which was probably just as well since I was struggling to summon any amateur outrage either at this state of affairs.
Possibly this was because we’d heard all about the €5m a good while ago, and forgot to be outraged then.
Or maybe the first true signs that this wasn’t really the big one came when world faux outrage champion Mourinho weighed in with his outrage, insisting this was the big one.
Even as the rest of the world were putting Big JDel up there with Chuck and Sepp and Jack Warner and the rest of the lads, you knew instinctively then there wasn’t all that much to see here, from our end.
Which isn’t to fully excuse JDel’s role in this episode.
It is a fine achievement to allow a little braggadocio turn a cosy chat with Ray D’arcy into a launchpad to international infamy.
Just as with much of JDel’s more high-profile work; whether it be divesting himself of his tie in celebration, or singing rebel songs, or starring in John the Baptist documentaries, when things invariably end in tears, I tend to hear my oul fella’s familiar words.
They are words a young lad might have heard, for instance, after he came a cropper off his bike when he’d been seen careering around a corner when no hands on the handlebars.
‘Good enough for you, acting the great fella.’
It is comforting, after a short absence, to note that we’ve already settled into the familiar rhythms of championship. These are subtly different to the rhythms of league, which mainly involve pointing out the meaninglessness of the competition and pining for championship.
Instead, at this time a year, most of our time is spent, football-wise anyway, pointing out the absurdity of the championship and pining for some kind of league in its place.
It is a fascinating circular exercise that has occupied us now for many decades. And as the suggestions for restructuring pour out of our most creative minds, as they do every year, we must again ask one vital question: are we equipped to deal with the vacuum in conversation if something is actually done?
A true hero for falling on his sword. After all, the only way to purge an organisation that has become a joke: Fire the communications guy for telling a joke.
A diligent bunch, we can be sure. Closer to home, I suppose we’d put them in charge of the investigation.
At least Busby called Gilesy into his office.
