WATCH: We need winning mentality to avoid ‘recipe for disaster’, says Martin O'Neill

Ireland managers present and past, Martin O’Neill and Giovanni Trapattoni, would surely be in agreement about one thing going into tonight’s defining game against Bosnia at the Aviva Stadium.

Even with an away goal in the bag, the cat is most definitely not in the sack. At 1-1 and, notwithstanding Robbie Brady’s best effort in Zenica, this play-off is still balanced on a knife- edge, the idea that the home side might not need to score to progress, simply anathema to the current occupant of the hot seat.

“We have to try to win the game,” O’Neill declared at his pre-match press conference. “If we set out with any other sort of mindset, things might not work out for us. We have to put things into perspective: Bosnia are capable of scoring and could wipe out the advantage of our away goal within minutes of the game starting and suddenly then they’re on the front foot.