Canada friendly is Kerr’s first chance to blood new players

BRIAN KERR will have the opportunity to introduce promising young players like Liam Miller (Celtic) and Sean Thornton (Sunderland) to Ireland’s senior international team when they play Canada in a friendly at Lansdowne Road on Tuesday, November 18, kick off 7.30pm.

Canada, like Ireland, will be building a team for the qualifying tournament of the 2006 World Cup and will visit Dublin in the course of a brief European tour. They will play the Czech Republic on Saturday, November 15, and plan to travel to Dublin on the following day.

Earlier this season Canada were in Finland where they lost another friendly to the home side 3-1. They also took part in the Conicaf Cup tournament but went out in the first round to Cuba.

The Canadians were listed at 83 in the latest FIFA rankings released earlier this month. They are four places above Georgia and eight places higher than Albania, two of the nations in Ireland's group in the Euro 2004 qualifiers. Ireland are at fifteenth, one place lower than a month ago.

This friendly will be the first match for the Republic and manager Brian Kerr since the defeat against Switzerland in Basel earlier this month which ended Ireland's hopes of qualifying for the Euro 2004 Championship finals.

Since Kerr took over the Irish job in February of this year in the midst of Ireland's qualifying series for Euro 2004, he has had little scope for experimentation as Ireland sought to make the finals, but with almost twelve months to Ireland's next competitive international, this match marks the beginning of a new era.

In the domestic league, St.Patrick's Athletic boss Eamon Collins is determined to put his team's FAI Cup final blues behind them when they play host to relegation-threatened Drogheda United in tonight's vital Premier Division game at Richmond Park (kick-off 7.45 pm).

"There is still a chance of a place in European football next season. I have told the players to forget all about last Sunday's 2-0 defeat by Longford Town at Lansdowne Road. We didn't deserve to win that game now we have to pick up as many points as possible in our last ten games," said Collins.

After that FAI Carlsberg Cup final defeat, Collins is able to welcome back French defender Kharim El Khebyr who missed Sunday's big decider because of a one match ban. Keith Fahey, who received a red card at Lansdowne will be available. He serves his automatic one match ban in next season's FAI Cup first round.

Collins is resigned to being without central defender Clive Delaney and midfielder Davy Byrne both ruled out by ankle injuries.

Drogheda manager Paul Doolin was delighted by last week's 2-0 victory over Waterford United at the RSC his first win in ten games since taking over as boss from Harry McCue at the Co Louth club.

"We played very well against Waterford and now we have to build on that platform and it is a bonus that central defender Aidan Lynch is back after serving out a one match ban," said Doolin.