Change in air as players lay down marker

With four games gone and six to play, Ireland will only be reaching the half-way stage of their European Championship campaign at the end of next March when Poland come to the Aviva for the first of two successive home games, although the second won’t come along until over two months later against Scotland in June.

And after that, it’s almost another three months again to the September double-header away to Gibraltar and at home to Georgia before the group finally wraps up in October with another double-header at home to Germany and away to Poland.

Such is the protracted, stretched out nature of an international qualifying campaign, and it makes it virtually impossible for Martin O’Neill to speak with anything like complete authority about how his team’s chances of qualifying for France 2016 might be enhanced, the manager knowing only too well a lot can happen over the next four months — and beyond – which will be entirely out of his control.