McShane comes out fighting

IT HAS OFTEN been noted that Paul McShane plays football with his heart on his sleeve.

But, by the sound of things, that’s not the only out of body experience his heart has been through during recent difficult months when he has been largely confined to a watching brief at Sunderland . A born competitor, the Wicklow boy hasn’t taken well to his demotion by Roy Keane.

“I’ve been ripping people’s heads off,” he says. “It’s just not nice being out of the team. It’s a hard thing to sit on the bench every week or even in the stand every week when you are giving it your all in training. The only thing I was short of doing was ripping my heart out of my chest and giving it to him. I have done everything. I have trained and out-trained everybody, out-performed everybody, so what can you do? It is hard to take when you are giving it everything. Within myself, I want to play every game.”