MICK McCARTHY insists his Wolves side will go for goals this afternoon but given the rate Arsenal have been scoring of late, a scoreless draw at home may feel like a victory by the time the final whistle is blown at Molineux.

Similarly, McCarthy reckons Ireland will head to Paris with every chance of qualifying for next summer’s World Cup as long as they can prevent France scoring at Croke Park, even if Giovanni Trapattoni’s men haven’t broken the deadlock themselves.

“Personally, I think we can win it and I don’t think it’s the game from hell that it’s supposed to be. France finished second in their group, didn’t they?

“They didn’t bash Serbia and Austria from what I remember. And if I was going for a second leg then I would prefer to go to Paris than going to Sarajevo or Russia or Greece or Portugal . . . Portugal are the best team in it.

“Anyway, they don’t have to beat them, do they? Scoreless in Dublin and 1-1 over there will do us fine, won’t it? Ireland had an excellent qualifying group and did as well as could be expected to finish second behind Italy.

“I don’t think they were ever going to beat Italy. The clean sheet is important. I think if you went to France off the back of a 0-0, I wouldn’t be too worried. It’s not a bad result.

“I have to say that Mr Trapattoni’s pretty good at making the team hard to play against. He’s got a record as long as my arm. People tell me that he still gets a bit of stick. I don’t know who’s giving him it to him with his record but it certainly makes me feel a lot better.”

The play-off games, he reveals, have been a topic of conversation within the Wolves camp since the group games ended a couple of weeks back, with squad members expressing opinions shaped, it seems, by the fortunes of their own national team. “I have a few different camps at the club. I have an Austrian and a Serbian for a start. The Austrian thought they (the French) were excellent and the Serb, predictably enough, didn’t.

“I have someone from France as well and I was asking him about the team. And all right, it sounds a pretty good team when he starts talking about it. If you catch them on the right day or the wrong day as it might be, then they can be very, very good.

“Sagna, Evra, and he went through them. And I thought ‘oh yeah!’

“But I don’t think they are that expansive that they are going to run all over the top of us, that’s for sure.

“I don’t think they will come and even try that here. It will be a cat and mouse game, I think.”

Summer signing Kevin Doyle has the potential to make a big impact on the play-off games and McCarthy reckons the experience will stand to the striker who looks to be settling well back into the Premiership.

“For want of a better cliché, you are always learning when you step up a level.

“Kevin was a very good Premier League player for a couple of seasons, went back to the Championship of course and stood out like a sore thumb there.

“I think he is a very, very good international player and I think he’s been terrific for Ireland when I have seen him.”

The manager is happy with the player’s performances at club level too and Doyle is expected to partner last season’s top scorer, Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, in attack this afternoon.

The home side’s fate, however, will be decided to a great extent by the ability of McCarthy defenders to cope with Arsenal’s attacking play and the ruthlessness with which the Londoners exploit openings.

Still, the former Ireland boss insists that his players will make a fight of today’s game.

“I won’t be sat here afterwards complaining ‘we didn’t have a go at them’,” he says.

“I won’t be sat with a beer in my hand thinking ‘we just let them just roll us over and tickle our belly.’

“I watched AZ Alkmaar at Arsenal, a fellow Champions League team, who over the last few years have won their league, have been fabulous and have some great footballers in there.

“Yet they got slapped completely when playing one up front, sitting back.

“They got played through, round, over, they just got murdered completely. We will try and play on the front foot.”

McCarthy added: “We know who we are playing against and, if I were to run through their team and highlight their strengths, I would just be putting our team on the back foot.

“But has the best team always turned up and won? No. I live in hope all of the time.”