Old friends find new ways to torture Ireland at Wembley

Taylor Harwood-Bellis doesn’t have any Irish family that we know of, but he will when he marries his fiancée who is, of course, Roy Keane’s daughter Leah. Is there no end to the ways they torture us now?

HEAD-TO-HEAD: England's Jude Bellingham and Republic of Ireland's Jayson Molumby after the final whistle in the UEFA Nations League Group B2 match at Wembley Stadium. Pic: John Walton/PA Wire.

The irony was lost on no-one back in September when Lee Carsley’s first game as England senior manager, in Dublin against a Republic of Ireland side he represented 40 times, was framed by two goals from old friends turned foes Declan Rice and Jack Grealish.

There is always scope for these shared threads in a fixture of interwoven loyalties and origins on both sides. That’s how it was again here in Wembley on Sunday evening when another Englishman with Irish blood took centre stage.

Harry Kane’s first big ‘impact’ was to be emptied by a Liam Scales tackle six minutes before the break. The Bayern Munich’s striker’s heavy touch as the home team threatened to break into space was nothing so much as a drop of blood in the water.

Liam Scales was on to the scent in a flash. It was beautiful. Old school. A meme of defiance in the making: like Richard Dunne’s iconic shirt in Moscow and Roy Keane’s settler on Marc Overmars in Lansdowne Road.

The 6,000 or so Irish fans, in fine voice all through that half and before it, showed their appreciation with a banging version of ‘You Boys In Green’ and those gleeful verses must have still been ringing in Kane’s ears as the half-time break threatened.

When Heimir Hallgrimsson first called for a b*****d in his team, it was the gritty Jayson Molumby who came to most minds and the West Brom’s harrying tendencies produced a petulant swipe from Kane that was duly hammed up by Waterford’s finest.

This was turning into a fine evening.

The thought had struck midway through the first-half that this was just like watching Manchester City as England wedged their opponents deeper and deeper into their half, squeezing the pitch with every five-yard slide-rule, lateral pass.

The problem for Carsley’s lads was that it didn’t feel like City in their pomp. It was more like the recent City that has puttered by Brentford, Fulham, Wolves, Southampton and Bournemouth by the odd goal, drawn with Newcastle and lost to Brighton & Hove Albion.

Ireland drew their sting in the first 20 minutes by doing a fine impression of a solid mid-table Premier League side at the Etihad. They were structured and disciplined with no empty prairies in the middle of the park for opponents to exploit.

After all the hand-wringing and the wailing about the lack of central midfield options, and the flooding forward of opposition waves, Hallgrimsson went and ceded the entire territory like it was a salient on a front that had been more trouble than it was worth.

The decision to name four central defenders and then plonk one of them, Nathan Collins, in front of the back line was working. It was Collins, despite that advanced position, who was invariably getting a toe here and a leg there as the last man back.

This was what Hallgrimsson had wanted, what he had preached after Finland had somehow failed to score at the Aviva Stadium on Thursday. He had spoken about the team’s need to “suffer” but even a dentist couldn’t have predicted the drilling to come.

It was Kane, the man with family in Letterfrack, wot done it.

He is 31 now, and a perceived lack of mobility is waved damningly at him like a batch of unpaid parking tickets in a local court, but the ball he played for Jude Bellingham that ultimately earned his own penalty and England’s opener was sublime.

It was the one tap that shattered the glass.

Five minutes later, and with Scales sent off, Ireland were three down, Anthony Gordon and Conor Gallagher having piled on the pain. It already felt like forever since Evan Ferguson had appealed for a stonewall penalty midway through the opening period.

The bigger worry was that Ireland still had over half-an-hour to go. Getting thumped 3-0 at Wembley by Gareth Southgate’s England was bad enough three years ago, but that at least had been played behind closed doors.

‘Ireland get battered everywhere they go,’ sang the home fans.

Hallgrimsson had made the point that this was a game between one side looking to win a World Cup and another just trying to make it to one. It was, and it got worse. Of course it got worse. A fourth and a fifth made it the team’s heaviest loss in a dozen years.

Topping off the hurt was that last one. Taylor Harwood-Bellis doesn’t have any Irish family that we know of, but he will when he marries his fiancée who happens to be Roy Keane’s daughter Leah. Is there no end to the ways they can torture us now?