FOUR days after naming his provisional squad for this Sunday's European Championship qualifier against Poland, Martin O'Neill was hit with a reality check. As he studied the team sheets from the weekend's Premier League programme, one glaring statistic smacked him in the face.
Ten Premier League matches resulted in just 12 Irishmen getting a start, two of whom - Damien Delaney and Joey O'Brien - have no chance of featuring against the Poles. Of the rest, six are employed by the four teams hovering just above the relegation zone, with the remaining four playing for sides occupying a top-half position: Shane Long at Southampton, Jon Walters, Glenn Whelan, and Marc Wilson at Stoke.
Little wonder then that O'Neill's rhetoric over his brief tenure has been largely concerned about placing things in perspective. "I'd love it if new players became available," he has often said. "But there aren't many around."
There certainly aren't. In an ideal world those who are eligible, the Stephen Irelands, Jack Grealishs, Harry Kanes, Mark Nobles, Patrick Bamfords, Nathan Redmonds, and Kyle Naughtons, would pick up the phone and tell O'Neill his is a cause they believe in.
It hasn't happened yet, though. Nor is it likely to. Instead, the Ireland manager must deliberate between a goalkeeper who is doing his best to keep Millwall in the Championship or a 38-year-old whose only outings these days are in the FA Cup.
He must look at the declining form of John O'Shea and accept that he isn't the same player who played in Champions League and FA Cup finals with Manchester United, but who instead is stuck in his fourth successive relegation fight with Sunderland. He will worry about the fact his preferred left back, Stephen Ward, cannot get into the Burnley team; that one of his very few match-winners, Aiden McGeady, has been fighting injury and that two viable contenders for a starting slot, Stephen Quinn and David Meyler, were only afforded brief cameo appearances for Hull against Leicester.
"Getting our strongest team out, having our best players available, that's key," said O'Neill. "Unfortunately it hasn't happened yet."
Due a chance in luck, the misfortune visiting the Polish team recently will have perked him up. Both their first choice full-backs, Lukasz Piszczek and Artur Jedrzejczyk, who ply their trade in the Bundesliga and the Russian top-flight, are injured, as is Kamil Grosicki, their excellent winger.
Better again, from O'Neill and Ireland's perspective, Borussia Dortmund winger, Jakub Blaszczykowski, is not included in Adam Nawalka's travelling plans, after falling out with the Polish manager after Nawalka took the armband from Blaszczykowski and handed it to Robert Lewandowski.
The issue clearly hasn't hurt the Poles yet, though. Top-scorers in this campaign, they also lead Group D and in Blaszczykowski's absence, the Ajax playmaker, Arkadiusz Milik, has filled the creative hole, scoring six goals in 14 internationals. That he is struggling with injury is clearly news O'Neill needed to hear.
O’Neill knows a tough road lies ahead. Poland, despite these absentees, still have a squad dripping with talent containing two Premier League players, two from Serie A, one from La Liga, four from the Bundesliga plus Ajax's Milik and Dynamo Kiev's Lukasz Teodorczyk, who at 21 and 23, are players on the way up.
In contrast, Ireland's squad is top-heavy with men whose days at the highest level are coming to an end. Just three players, Cyrus Christie, James McCarthy, and James McClean, are aged 24 or younger and alarmingly 11 members of his extended panel are in their 30s.
"There are good young players out there," says O'Neill. "But are they ready for a championship qualifier? I'm not so sure."
Whether the older players are ready is the bigger issue. Seven years have passed since Ireland defeated a decent team in a competitive fixture home or away, and despite some decent results in the meantime - draws home and away with Germany, home and away with Italy, away in France, away in Russia, home and away with Slovakia, away in Sweden, there have been some harrowing moments.
Losing 6-1 to Germany at home was the worst, coming as it did after the European Championship meltdown. There was a manager to blame which deflected from the burning issue, that the players available at the minute simply aren't as good as they used to be.
Worse again, the time available for O'Neill to improve them is not huge. They arrived in camp last Sunday, yet given how 48 hours are required for players to recover from club matches, training has had to be scaled down. Plus there is the burning issue of cabin fever. "The players will need time out from the team hotel," admitted O'Neill last week.
Otherwise they'd go stir-crazy, as they frequently did during the Trapattoni regime. That leaves brief windows of opportunity for O'Neill to get his players on the training field and prepare them for the rigours ahead. "In reality," a prominent former Irish manager told The Irish Post, "all O'Neill can really do is create an enjoyable environment. He needs weeks to get his point across on the training ground. All he gets are hours."
And all he will get is grief if Ireland don't make it. "The pressure can be huge," admitted one former Ireland manager. "Martin's big enough to deal with it."
Amid all this, though, positivity reigns. Ward, for one, believes Ireland can qualify. "We are right in the mix, especially if we can make our mark at home. If so, we have a great chance.
"Everyone knows what a big game this is. Yes, the Scotland match was disappointing but to have seven points from four games, we'd have taken that at this stage."
For ex-player, Kevin Kilbane, hope is evident. "I keep hearing that we are playing against a top-class side in Poland. They have a lot of pace, power and energy but I don't see anything to fear for the team going into that game, I really don't.
"They have a few quality players - but we have quality players in our side. A lot of those players, if they played with our lads at Premier League or Championship level they would be just like one of the ordinary players, a run of the mill player that will come into the side.
"If the team can get a good start in the game, they can get the crowd behind them that's the only way, it's up to the team to get the supporters behind them rather than the other way around."
Glenn Whelan remains an influential figure for the Republic of Ireland according to former international Kevin Kilbane. Photo: INPHO.And Kilbane thinks it can happen, particularly if Whelan and McCarthy stay fit. "Glenn goes under the radar for me. His contribution to the side over the last seven years has been immense, it really has.
“He is a good player to have in your side. When we lost 6-1 against Germany here, I don’t think he played that game and that was the biggest miss for me on the night. We didn’t have a player who was disciplined enough to do his job and sit in front of the back four and that’s why we were exposed.
“I think if we get him back it’ll be big for us and of course James, we know how good he is, how well he’s played over the last couple of years. He just hasn’t played consistently or regularly enough for us in the bigger games.
“Hopefully he stays fit between now and then and he plays because they’re our first choice. He has been playing well for Everton. I saw the Merseyside derby and also the match against Leicester when he and Seamus (Coleman) were Everton’s best players. Results haven’t been going well for Everton but those two have been going well.
“They’re the two who we all look to and to have fit because they’re our two genuine match winners and players who would get into most teams throughout the Premier League and Europe.”
There was a time when Shay Given would have got into most European sides. Now he cannot get into the Aston Villa or Ireland teams. Kilbane, though, believes O'Neill should take the plunge and start him against Poland.
“Shay is Villa’s best ‘keeper, that’s first and foremost. I’ve seen Villa play over the years and I don’t think Brad Guzan is in the same league as him, I really don’t.
“With David Forde, he hasn’t done anything wrong, has he? He’s played really well when he’s got in and he’s earned the shirt. But I still feel Shay’s Ireland’s best goalkeeper.
“He’s 38 but he’s still proven that he’s fit. What’s gone against Shay is the negativity around his performances at Euro 2012 but he had hardly any training for six or eight months prior to that. That went against him going into Villa’s next season.
“Last season he was back fully fit and he was outstanding for Middlesbrough. Now he’s playing outstandingly when he’s got into the Villa side, albeit in FA Cup matches.
“He is class. What he brings to the team in general is a little bit more calmness and stability. When I’ve seen Villa in those Cup matches, they’ve looked better as a team. So I would start him against Poland."
Whether O'Neill will is another question. Yet you get the sense this could be the defining game of his tenure and this campaign. Dropping Forde would be a big call, but if O'Neill believes it is the right one, then he has to take it.
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