Injury woes will force Martin O’Neill to mix and match

Partly because his hand has been forced by injury and partly because it was always his intention to experiment in these Easter friendlies, Martin O’Neill will once again mix and match for tonight’s friendly game against Slovakia at the Aviva Stadium.

The manager didn’t demur yesterday when it was suggested to him that while tonight’s game is the second audition in the space of a couple of days, we’ll have to wait until the visit of the Dutch in late May — a game which will take place on the eve of his final Euros squad announcement — for something much closer to a full-scale dress rehearsal for the Irish production at France 2016.

Shane Duffy showed on Friday night against Switzerland that there is still time for fringe players to stake a claim but, even so, the sense that the door is more half-closed rather than half-open is hard to escape in any even cursory consideration of the likely final 23.