Euro 2012: Aiden McGeady offers touch of flair for solid Republic of Ireland

For once, the full-backs were given licence to leave their own half and over-lap the wide men. For once, there was a modicum of adventure. This is a side that has got where it is today by being compact and disciplined and incredibly hard to beat, by following the law of the Trap to the letter. Saturday was different, but was it relevant?

Trapattoni once responded to critics of the sterility of his philosophy by saying, “If you want entertainment, go to La Scala.” So, after keeping the shackles on for four years, what chance of him now indulging his players, and the supporters, by loosening them only a week away from their opening game in the European Championship, against Croatia in Poznan? In reality, zero chance.

This is what Trapattoni was saying last week in the Irish camp in Italy: “I have said many, many times, there is the show and the result. You can have a beautiful show, but without a good result... After three days, the result remains, but the show is forgotten.” In case anybody didn’t understand where he was coming from, he mentioned Chelsea and Bayern Munich in the Champions League final. “There are teams that win and there are teams like Bayern,” he said. Point taken. The Republic’s gameplan is going to be the same as ever. Organisation and concentration at the back, with a little bit of trickery from Aiden McGeady and Damien Duff in wide midfield and, hopefully, the usual ruthlessness from Robbie Keane up front. The captain, 31 years old and 115 appearances and counting, remains at the heart of it. Seven goals in the qualifying campaign, six in the last qualifying campaign and three in four games in the finals of his one major championship, the 2002 World Cup. Keane is in the pantheon long since.

For Trapattoni, for four years, the end has justified the means. It’s been dull football, but it’s been effective. There’s always been a feeling that Ireland have the capability to play more attractive stuff, but there is also the counter-feeling that you’d be daft to change it when the conservatism delivers. Trapattoni doesn’t believe in the concept of the beautiful game, he believes in the pragmatism of getting a result. Since he became manager, Ireland have played 24 competitive games in World Cup and European Championship qualifiers and they have lost only two, winning 11 and drawing 11.

During those two campaigns only France and Russia have beaten them. In 2011 they went eight straight games without conceding a goal. They haven’t lost any of their last 13 matches going back 14 months and even then it was a 3-2 loss to a Uruguayan side containing eight of the team that started the World Cup semi-final eight months earlier.

Organisation is the watchword. Ireland are in a group with Spain, Italy and Croatia, but Trapattoni can see a way out of what appears to be a lost cause. Spain? Well, let’s assume they win the group and the other three are left to fight it out for the runners-up spot. Take Italy now. Their football is in crisis again. Their game is convulsing as it did before the 2006 World Cup, but unlike 2006 this current Italian side is in transition and it looks vulnerable. On Friday night they lost 3-0 in a friendly with Russia, the third successive match in which they failed to score. Last summer they lost 2-0 in a friendly with Ireland. Overall, Trapattoni’s Ireland have played the Italians three times, winning one and drawing the other two and in one of those draws Italy were behind until the last minute.

For a team that gives so little away, the Republic will see little to fear in the Azzurri. And Croatia? Ireland played Luka Modric’s team last August and drew 0-0, a confidence-booster given that so much of Croatia’s strength is in their attack. Modric played that day. Ivica Olic and Mario Mandzukic and Eduardo played chunks of the game also. And still they couldn’t break Ireland down. That was in the days before Nikica Jelavic started to make a big name for himself, of course. But, still, Ireland will not be intimidated by Croatia.

The ground-out results of the Trapattoni era do not stir the blood, but if they manage to scrape through the group the dynamic will surely change. For now, though, Trap is still having to fight some fires.

Just lately, Roy Keane and Andy Townsend both criticised McGeady’s international performances, Keane saying that McGeady was in a comfort zone and wasn’t delivering while Townsend called him too inconsistent. They felt Sunderland’s James McLean was a better bet, but Trapattoni gave them short shrift. “I know Roy Keane. I don’t know this other person [Townsend],” he said.

Ouch.

“Maybe they don’t follow Russian football or Aiden’s evolution,” he continued. “I wish to ask them if they always played well from the day they were born. Was every game in their life beautiful? I don’t listen to ex-players. I think the manager is better in this situation. I don’t answer to these people.”

McGeady played the second-half against Bosnia-Herzegovina and was outstanding. Trapattoni wasn’t slow in pointing it out either. The world knows of his volatility, his habit of hitting the roof when questioned too hard and there was another example of it last week when he was pressed on his reasons for dropping the Wolves defender, Kevin Foley, from his 23-man squad. Foley had been injured but looked to have recovered and said he felt Trapattoni had betrayed him.

“We speak about the training,” thundered the Italian, when quizzed about the “betrayal”. “We speak about what we can do again. The team is happy and play well. I don’t wish to speak again about this situation. Finished. Finished. Finished.”

The first, and only other, manager to bring the Republic to a European Championship was another cantankerous character, Jack Charlton, away back in 1988. Charlton was beloved in a way that Trapattoni is not, but the coming weeks might change that. Ireland’s last warm-up game is tomorrow against Hungary in Budapest. As ever, 1-0 will do them nicely.