Cox: I’m the man to beat Estonia

SIMON COX believes he is the right man to fill Kevin Doyle’s boots and fire Ireland to Euro 2012 in what he admits will be the biggest game of his career.

The West Brom striker was a shock choice to start Ireland’s final group game against Armenia but had been expected to lose his place for Friday’s first leg of the play-off with Estonia.

But with Doyle suspended and injury ruling out Cox’s club-mate, Shane Long, the former Swindon star could be given the nod alongside Robbie Keane in the do-or-die clash.

And the 24-year-old is adamant Giovanni Trapattoni can trust him despite having scored just one goal this season — against Bournemouth in a Carling Cup tie in August.

“Can I fill in up front? Definitely,” said Cox. “I have played alongside Robbie before and it has worked well — we have scored a few goals, which is always a highlight. Any part I can play in helping the team get to the Euros, I would be happy to play. If we get there it would be the biggest, most significant memory of my career.

“Would it be the biggest game of my career? Circumstances-wise, yes, definitely. Your first goal, your debut, those sorts of things spring to mind in terms of significance to me in my own career. But given the way the season has panned out and why we are playing the qualifiers, it is probably the most important game of my career.

“I’m really looking forward to it. Hopefully we can have a couple of days of good training before the game, and hopefully we can get the right result.”

And Cox admits the entire squad believes it is Ireland’s turn to qualify for a major championship after they missed out on the 2010 World Cup following Thierry Henry’s handball in Paris.

When that game took place, in November 2009, Cox was still 18 months away from making his international debut and instead watched on in horror as Henry’s handball was missed by referee Martin Hansson and William Gallas’s decisive goal was allowed to stand. And he believes Ireland are well set to qualify for their first European Championship since 1988 as they face a side 34 places below them in the world rankings.

“We would have taken anyone in the draw, but we have to beat Estonia,” he said.

“And we will take what happened in Paris as inspiration to win the game, but we can’t look at that (too much) as that was then and this is now.

“I watched that game at home — it would be wrong to say I was in the pub! I was devastated, especially with the scenes after the game as the lads were devastated on the pitch.

“All France’s fans were cheering and it wasn’t nice. Then you had players coming up to our lads and saying ‘unlucky’, but it wasn’t unlucky — they sort of won the game.

“Now we can all look at video replays and we at home could have known what had happened, but the referee didn’t see it as clear-cut as that.

“But do we believe it’s our time after that? I think so. We are on a good run of form, and are scoring quite freely while we’ve conceded one goal in our last nine games.

“If we can keep the basis of keeping the goals out and carrying on with our free-flowing forward play, we have as good a chance of qualifying as anyone.”