Hunt happy to wing it in competition for places

PRESS conferences are sometimes notable for what isn’t said rather than what is. That rule was tweaked ever so slightly in Malahide last night where it wasn’t about who turned up as much as who didn’t.

Four players were wheeled out for media duties ahead of next Saturday’s World Cup qualifier in Nicosia and it escaped no-one’s attention that none were involved on the side’s last, ill-fated trip to Cyprus in 2006.

In actual fact, less than half of the 14 players who featured in that 5-2 embarrassment are involved with the squad this week and, so far, it would seem that none of them has mentioned the war.