Ireland manager Mick McCarthy confirmed last night that he is resigned to losing Shay Given for the forthcoming World Cup qualifiers against Portugal and Estonia but insisted that Alan Kelly will join the squad on Tuesday despite being left out of Blackburn's side today because of a muscle strain.
Newcastle United manager Bobby Robson took the unusual step yesterday of publicly acknowledging that, while Given would play against Manchester City today, the club would be informing the FAI over the weekend that the Donegal-born goalkeeper's ongoing knee problem would prevent him travelling to Lisbon.
The remarks initially prompted an angry response from FAI president Pat Quigley who said that he couldn't see how a big club could act in that way but McCarthy later said that after talking with Given he was happy to let the matter rest.
"My concern is the player not the club," said McCarthy. "If he was saying that `yes,
I'm raring to go', then I'd have a problem but he's not, he says he's struggling so there's not really much point in getting worked up about it."
The loss of the 24-year-old goalkeeper is a blow to McCarthy but he insists the man who was his first choice when everyone was fit last month in Amsterdam will be all right by the end of next week.
"I've spoken to the doctor at Blackburn and he says he'll be fine by next Saturday which is good enough for me," said McCarthy. "We'll get Alan over and we'll take good care of him for a few days and I'm confident that he'll okay to play."
With Given gone McCarthy has the option of calling a player into his panel of 22 for the two games but the former Celtic and Manchester City man feels that it would be better to wait until after the weekend before making any decisions. "For a start, there wouldn't be a lot of point in calling up someone now only to see them getting injured over the weekend but anyway, it'll make more sense to sit back and see how things develop over the next few days," said McCarthy.
Meanwhile, Liverpool face a trip into the unknown when they take on Slovan Liberec of the Czech Republic in the second round of the UEFA Cup which takes place on October 26th and November 9th.
Rick Parry, the club's chief executive, said: "We are pleased with that although we don't know too much about Liberec, we'll be asking our Czech players Patrick Berger and Vladimir Smicer about them."
Bohemians' conquerors Kaiserslautern take on Iraklis of Greece while UEFA Cup favourites Inter Milan, winners in 1998, were paired with Vitesse Arnhem and Celtic play Girondins Bordeaux. St Gallen, who provided the shock of the first round by defeating Chelsea 2-1 on aggregate, play Club Bruges.
