Dunne: Mick has tackled fear of failure

Richard Dunne believes Mick McCarthy’s demand for his players to put the emphasis on applying rather than absorbing pressure — in contrast to what he saw as a fear of failure beginning to inhibit the team under the previous management regime — means Ireland are now in a better position to make home advantage tell against Switzerland tonight.

“I think one of the things of the Martin O’Neill era was the home games — we stopped going to win and we started playing where we didn’t want to lose,” says the legendary defender.

“In this campaign, there were signs against Georgia where we pressed them and put them under pressure.

“We started to get an atmosphere back in the stadium and just by doing that you give yourself a chance to win. You don’t go into a game looking at what Georgia can do to us, and I think it will be the same against Switzerland.

“We know they’re good and they are a decent side, but what are they like under pressure — if we squeeze them high, and we get the fans behind us and we start to look for victory rather than sitting back and hoping we don’t lose? I think that will be a big difference for us.

“Mick has added to the side, as we have seen against Georgia, and if we could repeat it against Switzerland, it gives us a better chance of picking up three points rather than hoping to get one.”

Even if the victory on the scoreboard was a narrow one, Dunne still feels the 1-0 win against the Georgians showed unmistakable signs of McCarthy’s bolder philosophy in action.

“It’s having the confidence from your manager to play the ball forward and keep the ball moving,” he observes.“There has to be a certain amount of freedom where if you give the ball away and they score, alright, but you were trying to do the right thing — just, shit happens. But if you don’t try and play you will never progress as a team.

“Mick will not be averse to lumping the ball into a corner and everyone squeezes and presses. That’s also a way to play football. That’s good football as well, getting the ball forward. We may not have the opportunity against Switzerland to pass the ball, because they are a big, strong side. But we can certainly play in their half and put them under pressure.

“The Denmark result aside, I suppose there were periods of good stuff with Martin O’Neill. But there seemed to be a disconnect between the fans and the players — the fans wanted us to press and push and attack and close players down. But the players didn’t seem to want to leave their own penalty area at times.

“The difference now is Mick is telling them to go and press, and I think the fans will relate to that. One bounces off the other and it will push us on. It will start to make Dublin difficult to come to again rather than, ‘lovely stadium, nice team that sits back, doesn’t put you under pressure’. Teams love that, whereas if we start to put them under pressure, teams will stop wanting to come here.”

All that said, Dunne concedes that, given Ireland’s current position atop the group, a share of the points tonight would not be unacceptable. But his point remains that avoiding a defeat should not be the goal.

“Yeah, a draw is not a bad result but the progression is you try and win the match. Previously we have tried to get a draw and that’s how it has played out in games and they’ve been awful and nobody has been interested in watching them.

“If we have a team that goes out to try and win a game and in the end we have to settle for a draw, because the other side is very good, you take that. But you have to give yourself the opportunity to win matches, and pressing teams and being on the front foot is how we’ve always succeeded.

“It’s not always been through beautiful football, but it’s been through hard work and there is no shame in us doing that again.

“If we have to settle for a draw, we settle for a draw. But we don’t go looking for them before games start.”