Lawrence plays the waiting game

AIDEN McGEADY is out of the Ireland squad for Wednesday’s glamour friendly against Argentina as the Celtic player continues to sort out his club future.

Giovanni Trapattoni confirmed yesterday that the winger, who is back in Glasgow after a flying visit to Russia, has been given time to finalise his lucrative move to Spartak Moscow. “We let him decide what he has to do so he is not with us,” said the Ireland manager.

And McGeady’s departure from Parkhead could open the door to a move north for Stoke City’s Liam Lawrence, who spoke to the media after the Irish squad trained in Malahide yesterday.

“I think you’ve hit the nail on the head,” he said.

“But you just never know. Football’s a funny old game. I’m just trying to train hard and keep my head down at Stoke. I’ve had a good pre-season and I’m feeling fit and strong.

“If nothing happens, I’m still a Stoke player and I’ve got three years left. I spoke to the manager about it a couple of weeks ago and he just told me to keep my head down. If something happens and it’s good for them and good for me, they’ll look at it, if not then he wants me to stay.”

Lawrence said that his eagerness to move to Celtic would not be dampened by their exit from the Champions’ League.

“I’m not one of those players who say they want to move because a club is in the Champions’ League,” he said.

“I want to move for football reasons. I want a new challenge. And if it comes about, then I’ll be champing at the bit to achieve things at Celtic because they need to push on this year and win things again.”

Has he exchanged any banter with McGeady about the situation?

“Just little bits. I spoke to him the other day, just fired him a text because I knew he was off to Russia. I’m not telling you what I said though! It’s a massive, massive move for him and it’s an important decision both football-wise and for him and his missus, so I’m sure that’s why he’s taking so long to decide what he wants to do.”

Despite emerging as a first-choice player for Ireland, culminating in an impressive showing in the infamous play-off game in Paris, Lawrence’s form for his country was not matched by opportunities to shine in the Premier League last year.

“It’s history now what happened (in the Stade de France) but it was a proud moment for me and my family, definitely,” he recalled. “So it was disappointing to go back to Stoke and not play so much after doing so well at this level. But that’s something you have to deal with it and, hopefully, if I stay at Stoke it will be different.

“For Ireland, it was a good year for me, although the disappointment of just missing out was hard to take. Everybody knows we should have gone through but they did and we didn’t. And they didn’t do so well.”

Did he take pleasure in the French fiasco? “I did, I’m not going to lie. I said I wasn’t going to watch the World Cup but I couldn’t help myself.”

For the European Championship qualifiers, Lawrence feels there can be no repeat of last year’s hard luck story. Nothing but qualification will do this time.

“It has to happen,” he said. “After coming so close and after such a good campaign last time I think it’s imperative that we go through this time.”

The first meaningful step towards that objective may not be until Ireland play Armenia next month but Giovanni Trapattoni clearly sees Wednesday’s game against Argentina as an important part of his preparations.

“We saw that, with a little bit of luck, we could also have gone to South Africa,” said the manager after training at Gannon Park. “It’s important that we believe this, and that we start again. I think Argentina will be hungry and will want to prove a point because I thought they were one of the three or four teams that could win the World Cup. So, after their disappointment, we can expect a hard game. And that will be a good test for us, after we played well against France, Italy and Brazil. I reminded the players of how well we played in those games and against Paraguay and Algeria, who also qualified for the World Cup finals.”

Although noting that the Aviva Stadium’s pitch is wide, Trapattoni insisted his team would not be using the fact that they are playing at a new home ground as any kind of excuse. A number of his players, he pointed out, are well-used to performing in similarly impressive surroundings.

With McGeady joining Glenn Whelan and Sean St Ledger on the sidelines, Trap is hopeful the absentee list won’t be extended, even though Kevin Doyle had a scan on a calf problem yesterday while Richard Dunne sat out training with a knock to the knee.