A quantum leap for Sammon

ASKED if Robbie Keane would come back into the team for the World Cup qualifiers in March, Giovanni Trapattoni yesterday gave one of his patented long rambling answers which left none of his audience any the wiser.

There was a bit about careers in journalism, a lot of talk about experience and mention of James McCarthy and Robbie Brady before, finally, he was brought back to the question in hand – would Robbie Keane return to the team for March? “Yeah sure,” said Trapattoni, with untypical brevity, as if there was ever any question to answer.

It was an unintentionally humorous moment but the laughter it provoked couldn’t mask the comment’s significance – Trapattoni, it seems, will largely revert to the tried and trusted for those crunch games against Sweden and Austria next month. At most, he allowed, there would be perhaps “one of two” changes and, to reinforce the point, he recalled how, when he was managing Juventus, he once won a title with a side which contained a couple of players who, just a year previously, had been playing third-tier football in Italy.

All of which appears to suggest that, while wholesale change is unlikely, for those young guns and newcomers itching to make an impression in tonight’s friendly against Poland, there is at least a glimmer of hope.

Conor Sammon’s call-up for this squad might have surprised many people – and not least, as he was happy to admit this week, the player himself – but he now goes straight into the starting line-up as a partner for Shane Long, with Trapattoni appearing confident that the Derby County man can give him a serious alternative when it comes to deciding on his striking options for the more significant tests to come.

The manager spoke enthusiastically about how, for a big man, Sammon has an unusually deft touch and, with his ability to hold the ball up and bring others into the play, can both help relive Ireland when under the cosh and open up space for the wide players. Citing Sammon’s strength and Long’s pace, the manager also said he was confident that they could form a productive partnership.

But it was John O’Shea, Ireland’s skipper tonight, who was quick to see the potential of the 6’ 2” Sammon restoring a traditional line of Irish attack in the fabled mould of Cascarino and Quinn.

“In terms of height I’d have to agree with you,” he said. “Strength-wise, Kevin (Doyle) and Jonathan (Walters) are fantastic. But, height-wise Conor, has that advantage and he’s a bit more nimble than those two fantastic players, Cascarino and Quinn.

“I played against Conor once or twice when he was at Wigan,” he went on. “He offers good physical presence up front but also a threat in behind. For a big man he’s quite agile and gets about the pitch well. Longy and Conor should give the Polish defence a tough start to the game. From what they’ve shown in training, they’ll apply massive pressure and won’t allow them to rest on ball. And, hopefully, that will give the team a chance to get up the pitch and squeeze a bit more.”

The hope then will be that Robbie Brady and James McClean can flourish on either flank, showing the attacking threat which the two wingers are capable of providing. McClean’s Sunderland team mate O’Shea described tonight as “a fantastic opportunity for James. He’s showing in the last few days in training a maturity, particularly defensively. In fact, maybe he does too much to help out the full back and should concentrate more on attack. But I’d be more than confident in him.”

O’Shea added that, to progress his claims, McClean just needs to keep doing the right things and when asked if one of those might be reactivating his Twitter account – as the player has just done – the Waterford man laughed and quipped that it could only be “a good sign.”

Behind McClean in the starting line-up tonight, Bristol City’s Greg Cunningham will be hoping to seize a long-awaited opportunity to impress the manager in the green shirt, even though all the signs suggest that, if both have fully recovered from injury, Marc Wilson at left-back and Seamus Coleman in the opposite berth will feature in the first 11 next month.

But there’s no doubt that tonight will be an especially significant one for goalkeeper David Forde, who gains only his fifth cap and his first since Trapattoni signalled that he has become his new choice as Ireland’s number one ahead of Keiren Westwood who, according to John O’Shea, was hoping to sort out a move in January in the hope of securing the regular club football he knows he needs to put him back into contention as the long-term successor to Shay Given.

Trapattoni also plans to give game time to the likes of Richard Keogh, Jeff Hendrick and Wes Hoolahan tonight but, as ever, stresses the importance of not allowing extensive experimentation to risk a result which would boost the team’s confidence, earn ranking points and ensure Ireland don’t go into those massive March tests on the back of an ignominious three home defeats on the trot.