FAI should have been more understanding - Martinez

WIGAN boss Roberto Martinez has said his club will ‘work together’ with the Ireland management over James McCarthy following his no-show for the national side this week due to an ankle injury.

However, it is understood Martinez feels the FAI should have been more understanding of the player’s fitness after an intense month battling to stave off relegation.

Having been out injured from October to February with an injury to the same ankle, McCarthy played a pivotal role in the club’s eventual survival, including all 90 minutes of Sunday’s crucial 1-0 win at Stoke. Wigan are also mindful of the emotion and potential controversy surrounding Ireland’s friendly with McCarthy’s native Scotland on Sunday.

Given such demanding circumstances, the club’s staff feel that even testing McCarthy’s already badly-aggravated ankle should be off-limits.

Martinez apparently attempted to diffuse the situation yesterday though, telling the Wigan Evening Post: “we’re going to work together (with the FAI) on this one and hopefully he’ll have a speedy recovery”.

Marco Tardelli yesterday inferred that process could have been helped had McCarthy conformed to FIFA’s regulations on such issues: “Sometimes it is possible to come here, have it assessed with the doctor and then go back”.

But football’s governing body are ambiguous on this issue. Annex One of FIFA’s ‘Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players’ states that any injured player “shall, if the national association so requires, agree to undergo a medical examination by a doctor of that association’s choice”.

But it then immediately follows that “if the player so wishes, such medical examination shall take place on the territory of the association at which he is registered”.

As such, the burden of obligation is open to interpretation.

McCarthy’s situation was only made worse, of course, by the absence of Stoke City’s Irish contingent of Jon Walters, Marc Wilson and Glenn Whelan.

The injured Walters is understood to have contacted the FAI yesterday, as it became apparent that his particular case was an innocent miscommunication.

The Stoke forward fractured a bone in his shoulder eight weeks ago, but played through the problem as the club reached the FA Cup final. Walters had another scan after his team’s defeat to Wigan on Sunday, when it was revealed the injury had been aggravated. He reportedly explained that to the FAI yesterday.

In the meantime, it has been confirmed that midfielder Whelan will join the squad for the Scotland game on Sunday.

Wilson’s situation is less clear. Tardelli yesterday said he is “out. He has a problem, injured.” But a source within Stoke City said that wasn’t the case. As far as the club hierarchy were concerned, Wilson was set to travel to Dublin on Tuesday morning. All three players had been given special dispensation to attend Stoke’s player-of-the-year awards on Sunday and come to Dublin later. In the event all three left on a club-arranged coach at 11.15pm.

Efforts to contact Wilson’s camp yesterday proved unsuccessful. Stoke also declined to make an official comment.

The entire situation was perhaps summed up by one member of Wigan’s staff yesterday: “This is what happens when you organise a tournament two days after the end of a tough season.”