Can Martin O’Neill overcome adversity like his predecessors?

IT IS the nature of managers to be both worriers and optimists. Some chase money, others attention and if politics is dubbed 'showbusiness for ugly people', then football management is its close cousin.

Martin O'Neill's personality bucks that trend. Endearing in his self-deprecation, he isn't afraid to poke fun either at himself or the vanities of other members of the manager's club – both Louis van Gaal and Paulo di Canio suffering the cutting edge of his wit.

Lately, though, there has been a lot less to smile about. Four competitive games without a win have raised eyebrows and lowered expectations. Is he as good as he once was? Was his time at Sunderland not so much a blip as evidence of his decline? The next couple of months will go a long way to answering those questions.

There wasn't meant to be this doubt. When he hooked up with the FAI, it was supposedly the perfect marriage, an Irishman coming home, after earning his stripes over a superb coaching career in England and Scotland.

But when indifferent results were posted in friendlies, questions were asked. These were easily swatted away, though. What relevance did they really have? And wasn't Brian Kerr sacked in spite of a remarkable run of form in non-competitive internationals, when he presided over a draw with Brazil, an away win in Holland, home ones against Romania and Portugal?

So when O'Neill asked to be judged solely on what happened in this European championship campaign, he was granted his wish. His CV allowed him that. Now, though, the level of trust is slipping away.

Losing to Scotland away was acceptable, not just because key players were missing that night but also because there was an available opportunity to cancel out that result by winning the return fixture in June. But Ireland didn't win. Nor could they beat Poland, so the can was kicked down the road again.

September offers hope. Georgia and Gibraltar. Six attainable points. "And then it will be interesting to see what happens," said O'Neill, suggesting, to all intents and purposes, that the Scotland and Poland that have played with unnerving confidence thus far in this campaign, will suddenly be different sides under the shine of the spotlight.

And perhaps they will, yet the evidence to date suggests that if this campaign comes down to temperament, then Ireland will be the ones who blink first. After all, they had the lead against the Scots but failed to retain it. They had home advantage against Poland but couldn't make it count. They have a legacy of blowing winning opportunities whereas the Scots and Poles are pretty much maximising their resources under the leadership of Gordon Strachan and Adam Nawalka.

To an extent, you can sympathise with O'Neill's predicament. He inherited an ageing squad and hasn't been able to dip into a transfer market – as he so cleverly did at Leicester, Wycombe, Celtic and even Aston Villa – and has been knocked back by talented, eligible players who weren't prepared to cross the Irish Sea: Harry Kane, Stephen Ireland, Jack Grealish (thus far) and Nathan Redmond.

Where would Ireland, and O'Neill, be now if this quartet felt differently about the team? It wouldn't be fourth. And if he hasn't shared the kind of fortune Jack Charlton was blessed with (Ray Houghton, John Aldridge and Chris Morris declared for Ireland within two years of Charlton's appointment) then he has also been deprived of the kind of luck Charlton had with injuries. "You pick the team," Charlton used to say to the Press. "You know what it is."

Under O'Neill, however, there hasn't been that consistency in selection.  At different stages of this campaign, Seamus Coleman, James McCarthy, Marc Wilson, Wes Hoolahan, Glenn Whelan and Aidan McGeady have been injured. "When I say we need a little luck, I mean in terms of having all our men available," said Roy Keane, O'Neill's assistant.

Niggles aside, though, some of the team's wounds have been self-inflicted. By choice, O'Neill has changed his goalkeeper, his left back, his wingers, his midfield and his forwards throughout last season. Inconsistency in selection has translated into inconsistency in performance.

"Things can change in one result, though," suggested Niall Quinn. "A couple of wins and the whole tone, the whole atmosphere within the public, just gets transformed."

IRELAND’S REMAINING FIXTURES

Gibraltar (A), September 4

Georgia (H), September 7

Germany (H), October 8

Poland (A), October 11

If this seems like wishful thinking then that – some will say – is because it is. Quinn is an O'Neill man. He appointed both him and Keane to the Sunderland job when he was chairman at the Stadium of Light.

Yet you also have to remember how he was an eyewitness to change. As a player, he remembers that only 17,000 turned up at Lansdowne Road when Liam Brady scored the winner against Brazil. A year later, you couldn't get a ticket for love nor money when the team was beating all before them in the warm-up games for Euro 88.

A generation later he watched both Holland and Portugal play superbly to reach the semi-finals of Euro 2000, where a combination of bad luck and even worse officialdom prevented those two sides meeting in the final.

Ireland, meanwhile, were in Chicago and New York, playing in a glorified end of season tour. "Yet we gelled on that trip," remembers Kevin Kilbane, one of the Irish tourists. "We forged a team spirit and out of it, I, for one, felt a hell of a lot more comfortable around the squad. And I wasn't alone. Damien (Duff), Richard (Dunne), Mattie (Holland), all felt part of it after that trip. It proved the making of us."

And of Mick McCarthy. If Zagreb and Skopje at the tail end of the Euro 2000 campaign had exposed his tactical shortcomings, then Amsterdam and Lisbon, where Ireland achieved credible draws against the Dutch and Portuguese, proved how much he had grown into the job. McCarthy kept Ireland unbeaten throughout that group, survived Iran, then Saipan, and came within a penalty kick of knocking Spain out of the World Cup.

Similarly, Trapattoni appeared to be on the way out after a 3-2 defeat at home to Russia in November 2010, but he regrouped, and didn't lose again for 16 internationals and 19 months.

O'Neill, too, has overcome adversity. Leicester's fans criticised him heavily in his first season yet he ended that year with promotion and ended his tenure at Filbert Street as the club's most successful ever manager.

Celtic called. O'Neill answered. They were Glasgow's second side then. By the time he left, they were respected right across Europe. So he has earned our trust. When he speaks with confidence of steering the team through these last four games, he should be taken seriously. "It can happen," insisted Quinn. Everyone in Ireland hopes he is right.

The majority, though, fear he will be wrong.