Lady Luck makes amends for Paris hurt

LET there be no more talk of Paris.

Whatever bad karma the gods wished on Ireland in Saint-Denis two years ago, it has been paid back in tidy little increments throughout a campaign which, post-Thierry Henry, has surely renewed the assertion that Giovanni Trapattoni is indeed a lucky manager.

Ireland have been dominated by Russia, Slovakia and Armenia for long periods — both home and away — during the course of Group B.

They have claimed victories when they might have drawn and earned a point on days when they could and should have lost.

Moscow, anyone?

Sure, there have been moments of misfortune too. Moments like Robbie Keane’s missed penalty away to Slovakia which cost two precious points, but the balance sheet was ultimately loaded heavily in Ireland’s favour after ten games and 13 months.

Even the wins against Macedonia were fashioned by fortune.

Remember Edin Nuredinoski?

It was the Macedonian goalkeeper who gifted Ireland three points in Dublin last March with his pair of bloopers.

Three months later and Robbie Keane was netting twice in Skopje courtesy of a deflection and a botched defensive clearance.

That’s four goals and, more importantly, six points handed to Trapattoni’s side on a plate right there and the win that secured them yet another play-off last night was claimed thanks largely to a freaky 16 minutes that very nearly ripped the heart out of the Armenians.

The visitors had dominated possession until the incident which saw Roman Berezovsky sent off — wrongly as it soon turned out — and that was compounded by Valeri Aleksanyan’s own goal which soon sparked comparisons to the one netted by Michel 21 years ago.

The Spaniard probably still has nightmares about that game, not just as a result of his unwitting contribution to a scoreline which ended 1-0, but because of the entire 90 minutes which was as far removed as possible from The Beautiful Game.

This was at the height of ‘Put ‘Em Under Pressure’ and the Real Madrid midfielder revealed subsequently that he spent large portions of that afternoon looking at the ball fly back and forth over his head and screaming ‘rugby, rugby’ over and over again.

There were shades of that again last night. Not as blatant but they were there.

Not for the first time in this campaign, Ireland played the role of Beast to the opposition’s Beauty, especially in that first half an hour when the home side failed to put anything together that even vaguely resembled a passing move.

It was Vladimir Weiss who described Armenia as the best footballing side of the six contesting in this mini-competition and the Slovakian manager’s theory was lent serious weight five days later when Vardan Minasyan’s side beat them 4-0 in Zilina.

THE Armenian coach has been deeply influenced by Barcelona and Arsenal and there were clear signs of that in the opening exchanges when three separate attacking moves were given extra zip and space by a hat-trick of clever backheels.

More impressive was their reaction to adversity. Though a man and two goals down and with a side built on the premise of youth and all the fragility that sometimes entails, Armenia never gave up on the pursuit of the three strikes they needed.

In the end, Ireland survived because that is what they do but the questions must be asked as to whether a Scrooge-like defence and rigid adherence to Trap’s 4-4-2 will be enough to negotiate the last two steps to the promised land.

That said, it would be churlish to begrudge the likes of Shay Given, John O’Shea, Richard Dunne, Kevin Kilbane, Keith Andrews, Damien Duff or Robbie Keane their days in the sunshine of Poland and Ukraine.

All seven are over 30 already and, as was the case this month with the likes of Brian O’Driscoll and Paul O’Connell, this will be their last chance to represent their country on such a stage before they make way for the next generation.

The likelihood of that will become more apparent when the draw for the play-offs is made in Kracow but, whatever the pairing thrown in our direction, it will be difficult to complain if the opposition proves to be one of the more difficult names in the pot.