O’Neill’s faith pays as he gets best out of McGeady

It was over a decade ago when this reporter first had the opportunity to come across Aiden McGeady at a routine press engagement ahead of a fixture for the Irish U21 side for which he was appearing at the time.

One of the hotels surrounding Dublin Airport was team HQ. Not the shortest of journeys. Nor, on that occasion, the most profitable. McGeady delivered a few monosyllabic words mumbled incoherently in an impenetrable Glasgow accent.

He was just breaking into Celtic’s first team under Martin O’Neill at the time and his decision to ignore the belated ‘come hithers’ of the Scottish Football Association had already marked him out as a man to watch in green.