Green day dawns for Pilkington

At the sixth time of asking, Anthony Pilkington has finally been able to answer Ireland’s call.

We’ve had explanations, apologies, medical reports, pictures of his kids in Irish shirts and, over the weekend, even a fresh tweeted image of his passport and boarding card and, now, finally, here he is in the flesh, sitting in a dressing room at Gannon Park after his first training session with Giovanni Trapattoni’s squad.

The root cause of the long delay can be located in the Norwich winger’s knee, where tendonitis has become a recurring problem.