'There's nothing to fear' - Josh Cullen backs Ireland's spirit to prevail despite Serbs' 'British-style' jibe
Ireland midfielder Josh Cullen believes that Stephen Kenny’s side can find the right mixture to overcome Serbia in Belgrade tomorrow after the Serbian camp wrote off the chances of Ireland’s “British-style” game being a success.
Morale in the Irish camp has been hit by a run of seven games without a goal scored and Serbia, buoyed by the return of national hero Dragan Stojkovic as coach, have already targeted a nine-point haul from their three qualifiers this week, with defender Stefan Mitrović claiming that his side’s quality would win out against Ireland’s British-style counter-attacking game.
But Anderlecht man Cullen, in line to start a competitive game for the first time, says there is nothing to fear in Belgrade. “As players we are confident and ambitious that we can qualify for the World Cup. If we didn’t believe we could do that there’d be no point in turning up,” he told the Irish Independent.
“Of course we can think of qualifying, there’s nothing to fear, we are going to Serbia to try and win the game, there’s no reason why we can’t do that. One of my memories of watching Ireland at home was the 1-0 win over Germany, the Shane Long goal, if you’d have asked people before that game if Ireland would win the majority would say no but we did.
“There’s no reason why we can’t produce more of those nights with the Irish spirit we have, to go to Serbia and win and we fear no one.”
Analysts such as former Ireland defender Richard Dunne have criticised Ireland’s possession-based approach under Kenny but Cullen, his career on the up after a move from West Ham to Vincent Kompany’s Anderlecht, says the Irish side can mix it.
“We will approach the game in the way the manager instructs us to, there are times in every game where you have to be physical, win battles and win second balls and earn the right to play,” he added.
“No team will let us go out and knock the ball around, play our stuff and not lay a finger on us, we have to be up for the battle, which as a nation we always are but at the same time we have quality players who can win games and we are confident we can go into the campaign and win enough games to qualify for the World Cup, we want to be successful and that has to be our aim.
”There was a boost for Kenny before they left their Manchester base to fly to Belgrade as the entire squad tested negative for Covid-19. They train in the match venue tonight.
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