Five points from the first three qualifying games? Well, it doesn't make it easy singling out a player of the week but seeing as he's doing a pretty good job resurrecting a career that appeared to be stumbling we're opting for Richard Dunne. Only weeks ago he was on the verge of moving down a grade to join Wimbledon but now, after three fine performances for Ireland, he has a few Premiership clubs on his trail. On top of all that he scored his second goal in six internationals on Wednesday - by our reckoning he'll have broken the Irish goal-scoring record by mid 2004.

Special mentions too for Nick Colgan, who won his first senior call-up last week and then kept a clean sheet against Rangers on Saturday to keep Hibernian in touch with Celtic, and Tommy Coyne who marked his first ever manager of the month award by scoring for Clydebank against Stirling Albion, helping keep them top of the Scottish second division.