Carr gears up for return to action
Carr, 26-years-old but wiser because of his extended battle to recover fitness, admitted he found it hard to subdue his natural urge to play again at the top level and had feared his football career was prematurely ended by his cruciate ligament injury.
He last played for Ireland against Estonia on June 6, 2001, and the injury cost him his involvement in the World Cup finals in Japan and South Korea. But his spirits were sustained by the support of good friends and the joy he and his wife had of welcoming a new baby into the world.
Carr, never known for being effusive in his assessment of life as a professional footballer, was open in his attitude and outspoken in his comments when he renewed acquaintance with the Irish press corps after Ireland’s training session yesterday at Ayr.
The scars on his knee told their own story, but the happy expression on his face reflected a man enjoying his involvement once more with Ireland.
“This has been a long time coming for me and I also had to pull out of the last game against Greece through injury. At one stage I did think that I would not play for Ireland again,” Carr said.
“My confidence was low and I could not see a positive outlook because I was really struggling. I never had a bad injury before so the experience has made me a stronger person mentally. I’m just as hungry as I ever was to succeed with Spurs and Ireland.”
“There are bigger tragedies out there than missing the World Cup and obviously a lot of good things happened to me during that time as well.
“My wife had a baby, Anthony, nine months ago and his birth made me realise there are more important things in life than football. Hopefully there will be other World Cups for me.
“Richard Steadman (his American surgeon) was brilliant. But I also worked with people at the club who really helped me. There were a few hiccups along the way with extra injuries but these things happen.
“This is a new beginning for me and what happened to me in the last year-and-a-half is gone. What I’m really looking forward to doing now is trying to get back into the team and prove that I’m worth a place.”
Matt Holland reflected on the new optimism sweeping through the Irish camp since they began working with Brian Kerr and his new team two days ago. He admitted he had known Kerr only by reputation until then and said: “I’m looking forward to this fixture, it’s a big game for us and if you look at the form of the two sides Scotland are perhaps in better form than we are.
“We’ve had a couple of disappointing results. It would be great to get Brian off to a winning start.
“Brian has got a terrific reputation with the under-age sides and I’ve enjoyed working with him in the short period we’ve been with him. Holland said he was much more familiar with Kerr’s assistant, Chris Hughton, and said: “I was a player with him at West Ham. I’ve known Chris a long time and I’m looking forward to it.
“Getting off to a winning start against Scotland is important and more importantly the Georgia and Albania games at the end of March where hopefully we can get our European Championship campaign back on the rails.”
Holland said he would not accept the view that was propagated in some areas after Ireland had lost their opening matches in the European Championship to Georgia and Albania that they had over-achieved at the World Cup.
“I dispute that,” he said. “Ireland did extremely well at the World Cup and we deserved what we got. We deserved to go as far as we did and we would not have been flattered had we advanced to even more rounds.
“There is a very good nucleus of players available to Ireland, players of good quality who are experienced and very ambitious to do well. Obviously losing our first two matches in the championship was a disappointment but we have enough quality in the squad to get things back on track and that is what we will be setting out to do.”
He spoke of his introduction to Kerr and said: “Brian has got a terrific reputation for the work he has done at under-age level. He has had great success with Ireland’s under-age teams.
“I have enjoyed working with him over the past two days and with Chris Hughton, whom I have known for a long time.
“He is a very highly-qualified coach and very well-respected for the work he has been doing with Spurs and we have a good team.
“It would be terrific if we can get Brian’s career off to a winning start but the real focus has to be on the championship matches that are coming up. They are of paramount importance to us.”
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