At Monday’s scheduled FAI board meeting, discussion of Stephen Kenny’s performance was limited to a few short minutes.
he tone was not in keeping with the reaction to the weekend defeat to Luxembourg which featured questions about whether the Irish boss should stay or go.
He will be staying for the foreseeable and can therefore plan ahead to the summer and beyond.
But there will be much to reflect on in the coming weeks and, while Kenny struck a defiant tone in the aftermath of the weekend draw with Qatar, there will be introspection too.
After a long build-up to the March window, the important business culminated with a return of zero points out of a possible six and it’s very hard to put a positive spin on that. It’s a disaster with World Cup qualification in mind.
The significance now is what is learned from it and whether the low of Luxembourg really does represent a turning point in the Dubliner’s reign.
A lot of action was crammed into six days with three matches all throwing up their fair share of storylines. And there were aspects of the performance against Qatar on Tuesday which naturally led to ‘what ifs’ about the lethargic showing three days earlier with points on the line.
Kenny isn’t a golfer, so he may not be familiar with the concept of a mulligan but if he was to get another shot at the week just gone then it’s plausible he might approach certain aspects of it differently.
Youth v Experience
The headlines after the manager’s post-Qatar reflections were naturally dominated by his deliberate attempt to hit back at certain critics but he did cover other topics in his press conference in Hungary.
Perhaps the most interesting answer came in another section where he discussed the changing profile of his dressing room and the number of youngsters that he integrated into his set-up.
"I think this is a new era of these players coming into the team and learning from the Séamus Colemans, the James McCleans, all of those players, (to learn) what it means to play for Ireland and the values they have. That can only improve them,” he said.
"We've got a lot of talent coming through and ok, all of them maybe aren't ready yet but they will be in due course."
That read a small bit like an admission that responsibility may have come too soon for a couple of his fresh faces.
To pitch names into that discussion involves speculation but, in hindsight, the Luxembourg performance was reliant on youth in the spine of the team. Dara O’Shea did well enough in the centre of the back three even if it’s a serious role of responsibility but perhaps a real issue was in midfield where Josh Cullen and Jason Knight were the central pair behind alan Browne.
An out of sorts Matt Doherty and Enda Stevens were the wing backs but there was a hesitancy in the Irish play overall. While question marks persist over whether Shane Duffy will ever thrive in a back three, O’Shea will have benefited from a game alongside him. Portugal in September may require a distinctive gameplan but for the home match with Azerbaijan that follows, where Ireland will have to set the tempo, it wouldn’t be a huge surprise if the older heads come to the fore.
The Goalkeeper Call
Everyone is a genius in the aftermath and, to be fair, aspects of Gavin Bazunu’s display in Debrecen illustrated that he’s only a teenager. However, there's no doubt that he’s playing with confidence at the moment and if the Irish camp believe he's a better netminder than Mark Travers – which appears to be the sentiment – then maybe they should have just gone with the Dubliner in Belgrade.
Kenny said at his squad announcement that Travers would be next in after Caoimhin Kelleher and that was before the team got together on the training ground. The Kildare man does have marginally more experience, but hasn’t seen any action since the beginning of February. Bazunu looked sharp and is assertive and you can be sure if the game was taking place next week, he’d be selected between the sticks. It would be harsh to labour the point, but they might just have got that one wrong.
Pace Up Top
It's a big old pitch, the Aviva. Alas, Ireland didn’t exploit the benefits of that against Luxembourg and the reaction to Aaron Connolly’s omission from the plans for Saturday was a mistake. Kenny did speak about how Connolly causes problems even if he doesn’t necessarily always deliver end product.
"Aaron Connolly probably would have given us what we didn’t have against Luxembourg because of his different characteristics and his ability to stretch a defence, as he did against Serbia,” said Kenny ahead of the Qatar game. “People said he wasn’t that effective on the night but his constant running behind just completely opens up the play for someone like Alan Browne or Callum Robinson.”
It goes back to the emphasis on youth but Shane Long provided that service against Qatar and, while he missed another gilt edged opportunity on Tuesday, the positions he took up justified his involvement. Ireland did also change the support structure with Daryl Horgan and Robbie Brady flanking the central striker and maybe that approach is the way forward in that system even when Connolly returns. Adam Idah is another option but Long has a role to play until he comes through as Ireland need the change of pace in that department to bring them up the park.
The Back Three?
There’s a question mark with this one because it’s possible Kenny does not regret this switch at all. With a view to the longer term, it’s conceivable he has concluded this is the way to go. For all that he rowed back on aspects of the Luxembourg selection by bringing in the older guard midweek, he still did stick with his guns by resisting a temptation to revert to a back four.
It has been pointed out that his new coach, Anthony Barry, is coming from Chelsea where they operate that way. Seeing as most of the preparation for Serbia was conducted remotely, the assumption is that three at the back was the plan in the back pocket for some time.
The determination to give it another whirl against Luxembourg hinted at a move towards a broader transition, a slight surprise given Kenny’s long term love of a back four, but the tweak in attack after that fixture suggests that maybe they needed a longer window to learn how the strategy would suit their personnel. A summer camp in Spain should provide a window to work that out. But there’s no erasing the Luxembourg result from the record books.
