Christie’s debut tinged with sadness

Ireland newcomer Cyrus Christie has revealed his swashbuckling debut on Tuesday was tinged with sadness due to a family bereavement.

The Derby County full-back proved an able deputy for Seamus Coleman, with an assured 90 minutes against a USA side packed with attacking impetus.

However, the 20-year-old explained afterwards some of his family were unable to be present for his big international bow due to the funeral of an unspecified relative yesterday.

“It was a close family member that died,” said Christie, who declared for Ireland through his grandmother, who was originally from the North Wall area of Dublin.

“Some of my family couldn’t come to the match because of the funeral being the next day and they stayed back in Coventry. But some did travel over and my family from Ireland were here as well to watch the performance, so I was delighted they came.”

Asked whether the untimely death added to the stress of his looming first taste of international football, he replied: “No, it was fine. You have to deal with it.

“It felt good to make my debut, and in front of the home fans as well. It was a great feeling and, obviously for my family and friends to be here, to pull on the Ireland jersey was a fantastic achievement.”

Unluckily for Christie, in Coleman he’s competing for a place against one of the few certain starters in Martin O’Neill’s side. There has been a suggestion his versatility could see him challenge Stephen Ward on the other side of the defence, a task he’d readily accept for the next European qualifier against Poland in March.

“I watch Seamus on Match of the Day week in, week out and he’s probably been the best right-back in the Premier League for the last few years,” said his younger rival.

“It’s obviously going to be tough competition for me to start but there is no way I can obviously start ahead of Seamus. There is no problem with me playing left-back. I have played there many times throughout my career. But I think Robbie (Brady) has also proved today that he is more than capable of taking that role on too.”

Anthony Pilkington may well have seemed like another fresh face to the home crowd as his goalscoring display marked only his eight cap since being introduced to the squad 14 months ago by Giovanni Trapattoni.

Now he’s off the mark, the Cardiff City wide-man has Group D leaders Poland in his sights. He said: “Poland are top but it’s all in our hands now. If we take maximum points from the two games against them, it sets us up really nicely.

“The manager told us before the USA game places against Poland were up grabs. I haven’t played as much as I would have liked but I enjoyed scoring my first goal and playing well, you always put the option in the manager’s mind for the next match.”