Keeper of the flame

After 15 years of highs and lows, Shay Given is still passionate about playing for his country, Liam Mackey reports

EDDIE COCHRANE sang that they’re ain’t no cure for the summertime blues. But Shay Given reckons he’s found a surefire one — three points to take to the beach from Skopje.

“Well, for sure, that would be ideal,” he smiles. “I’ve a few weeks off after this before we go back pre-season and it’s important to get the right result because you’ll be seething for the whole summer if you don’t. And to finish the season on a high would be fantastic for the whole country.”

Fantastic for Given too, who has had to contend with first team exile at Manchester City and then that shoulder injury which ruled him out of the home victory over Macedonia in March. Bizarrely, the keeper picked up the injury, for which he required surgery, during the warm-up for City’s Europa League game away to Aris Thessaloniki in February.

“When I injured the right shoulder I didn’t even think I’d done it, I was playing golf the next day and everything,” he says. “I had a scan the day after, just a precautionary scan, and it was then they said I’d torn a tendon. I didn’t even feel as though I’d done anything to it. But it had to be fixed. It was just one of those disappointing things because I missed out on the last couple of games but I feel fine.”

The damage this time was to his right shoulder, making it a double whammy for the Donegal man, who had suffered a serious injury to his left shoulder the previous season. But he insists he bears no physical or mental scars now.

“No, no, if anything they’re probably better than they were before because of all the rehabilitation I’ve done on both shoulders,” he says. “They’re probably stronger than they’ve ever been because I’ve really focused on the gym and doing a lot of core work and strength work, especially on the shoulders. I’m probably better than ever.”

It certainly looked that way in the Carling Nations Cup game against Scotland where Given’s man-of-the-match performance ensured that Ireland retained their one-goal lead right to the end.

“I was happy with the Scotland game,” he says. “I haven’t played for a long time as you know and obviously Northern Ireland didn’t really give us a test so it was nice to be more involved against Scotland. I feel great. I just miss the buzz of playing really.”

Encouragingly for tonight’s test, Ireland didn’t fold under considerable Scottish pressure at the Aviva, something which they have had an alarming tendency to do in games where they have taken the lead in the past.

“I don’t think we played that great against Scotland, to be honest with you,” Given observes. “We think we can play better. As you say, they had long spells in the second half where they kept the ball and we defended as a group and got great blocks in, and headers, and clearances. We caught them offside quite a few times as well. Our line was pretty good at the back. I’m sure Macedonia will have spells out here in their home place with the ball and we’ll have to be solid again and stick together.

“They showed in Dublin that they are a pretty good team. It’s not going to be an easy game. Especially, attacking-wise, they’ve got some very good players going forward. I just think if we can get at them a bit, they’ve got some weaknesses, particularly at the back, and if we can impose our game on them I think we’ve a good chance of getting the right result.”

One would think it would certainly help Ireland’s cause if Macedonian coach Mirsad Jonuz again selects Edin Nuredinovski, the hapless keeper who had a careless hand in both of Ireland’s goals in the 2-1 win at the Aviva. Given will hardly complain at a repeat performance but his membership of the goalkeepers’ union means that he can’t help but adopt a sympathetic stance.

“This is the life of a goalkeeper, you know?,” the 35-year-old reflects. “He won’t look back on the game with much pride or whatever. But if you make a mistake as a goalkeeper then nine times out of 10 it’s a goal. He had a disappointing night but we’ve all had bad nights before.”

Not least Ireland, and here in Skopje too. Given was out injured for that infamous game in 1999 when a goal at the death by Goran Stavrevski cancelled out Niall Quinn’s opener and denied Ireland a place in the European Championship finals.

“I was in Donegal at the time, watching it with friends and it was heart-breaking for everyone,” he recalls. “I was chatting to (Ireland’s keeper on the night and now the squad’s goalkeeping coach) Alan Kelly about it yesterday and he said the ref said, ‘this is the last kick of the game’, with the corner coming in. But that’s the past and hopefully we can put the record straight tonight.”

Ireland began their latest Euro campaign with a significant win in Yerevan against Armenia last September, and Given is hoping for a similar outcome in the side’s last competitive international of the season.

“It was a great start for us and we’d take another 1-0 for sure,” he says. “It’s all about getting as many points as we can. Hopefully we can get three but it’s going to be a tough game. It’s going to be very similar to Yerevan as well with the weather conditions. It’s going to be quite humid and sticky but we should be okay.

“We’re not going out just to shut up shop and hope to come away with a point. We want to win the game.”

Since Given is a man who has taken flak from Roy Keane for showing up for too many games for his country, he is an obvious man to ask for a view on the stay-away players who have dominated so much of the newspaper columns and radio waves in the build-up to tonight’s game.

“It’s been disappointing, very disappointing,” he says. “You know, this is a massive game and even last week was great preparation for everyone. I don’t know what words you can…I think one of you guys wrote in the papers that (Giovanni) Trapattoni might have to summon three players to play in Macedonia and I just looked at that and thought, ‘if that’s what it’s come to, there is something really badly wrong’. Because they should be queued up outside the hotel to get in the squad and pestering them when they’re not in the squad instead of the other way around. It’s very disappointing but this is the way of the world.

“I don’t know if it’s a generational thing but when I was younger I was desperate to come over, meet up and play in the games. I don’t know why that seems to have changed. It shouldn’t have changed. I still look forward to coming in and playing, after 15 years. I just don’t understand the mentalities now.

“It’s probably the manager’s job (to talk to them), to be honest. But we’ve spoken to you guys in the media about it and Robbie (Keane) has said a few words as well. All I can say is that, as the senior players, we are disappointed with their attitude to what is a huge game.”

Given’s greatest save?

Zinedine Zidane was denied by a flying save.

ONE hundred and 12 caps for his country translates into an awful lot of saves by Shay Given but if an independent judge had to pick just one then why not a top drawer denial of a top-drawer player?

The occasion was the World Cup qualifier between Ireland and France at Lansdowne Road in 2005. The match was only seven minutes old, and still scoreless, when Richard Dunne brought down Thierry Henry about 25 yards outside the box at the Lansdowne end.

Up stepped the incomparable Zinedine Zidane to take the free. And it was a trademark belter, the great man wrapping his right foot around the ball and whipping it over the Irish wall at ferocious speed and with lethal bend. But Shay Given was equal to it, leaping across his goal and, with one firm hand, batting the ball away to safety from almost under his crossbar.

Unfortunately for Brian Kerr’s Ireland, Henry had the last laugh on a night when France took a giant step towards Germany 2006 at Ireland’s expense.

But if the match will be mainly remembered for Henry’s sublime goal as well as for marking Roy Keane’s last game in the green shirt, it has also ensured immortality on Youtube (http://bit.ly/fCVBji) for one of Shay Given’s greatest ever saves.