McCarthy to start against Serbia

Marco Tardelli has confirmed James McCarthy will start for Ireland in Belgrade tomorrow night but whether as part of a two-man or three-man central midfield remains to be seen.

With Giovanni Trapattoni dropping hints about a possible system change for the friendly against Serbia, his assistant manager confirmed the squad tried out a 4-3-3 formation in training at Gannon Park yesterday. But asked if Ireland would adopt that formation in Serbia, he replied: “I don’t know. But, yes, it is possible. We can try during the match and change back.”

Echoing previous comments by Trapattoni, Tardelli said the short time the management team has with the players makes it hard to work on a different approach. But when pressed on the issue, he was quick to turn the tables in defence of 4-4-2.

“I want to ask you why you want to change the system?” he shot back.

“I think in four years we achieved good results. So why do we want to change the system? Ferguson played the same system, he started to play it 30 years ago and he still plays it. England play the same system.

“Yes, it’s possible to try but we need the players for one week, 10 days. Everything is possible but we need time and we need the players; sometimes they have lots of injuries and we need them all.”

With a depleted Irish squad flying out of Dublin today — Keith Treacy (groin) and Stephen Ward (knee) the latest to withdraw — Tardelli said he hopes for evidence from the friendly that the panel has strength in depth.

“I hope the young players show it is possible to play for Irish team,” he said.

“We feel we have good young players and it is important they show us what they can do. I think McCarthy is a player who is important for us, he’s a new player, also [James] McClean and others.”

Meanwhile, Simon Cox is one of those flying out to Belgrade today, even though the ink is scarcely dry on his new Nottingham Forest contract after he joined the Championship side from Premier League West Brom.

“Yeah, it’s all done,” he confirmed. “It’s a bit of a pain because I signed Saturday and then came over so I haven’t had a training session or anything like that but I can’t wait to get started. I like the way they play, and it’s a big club with lovely facilities.

“I thought it would be a good place to go and play football and be a striker again. I never got regular football at West Brom which was disappointing.”

Cox acknowledged the timing of this international friendly is far from ideal.

“Obviously, it’s a pain because the season starts just two days after you get back.

“But you do need a friendly match before the next international campaign starts, otherwise you go into that not familiarised with everyone in the squad. Obviously, the Euros were a disappointing time but now we’ve got a chance to come back quite quickly.”

Forest host Bristol City in their opening game at the weekend which, on the back of the trip to Serbia, means Cox is up against it if he wants to hit the ground running at his new club. “I’ll have one day to do it,” he laughed. “But I think I’ll be mostly on adrenaline for the first game, anyway. I’ll probably be running around like a headless chicken a little bit but I’ll probably play quite well too.

“The travel to Belgrade? You could take me to Korea and I’d still want to come back and play.”