ALAN O'NEILL, assisted by Terry Eviston, will take charge of Shamrock Rovers for the remainder of the season following the resignation yesterday of the management team of Ray Treacy and Tony Macken.

Time eventually ran out on the beleaguered Treacy when he was summoned to a meeting with the club chairman, John McNamara, in the wake of Sunday's 2-0 home defeat by Sligo Rovers.

That extended a losing championship sequence to five games and taken in conjunction with "their FAI Cup elimination after a first round replay with Shelbourne, it made Treacy's position virtually untenable.

"It was with great regret that I accepted the resignations of Ray and Tony," said McNamara. "They have brought great success to this club but we must accept their decision."

Treacy, appointed to the job just over four years ago, led the club to the Premier Division championship in his only his second season at the RDS. Almost immediately, however, he lost the services of two of the chief architects of that success, Stephen Geoghegan and Alan Byrne, and never really recovered from the double setback.

O'Neill and Eviston, both 38, shared in the championship triumph after rejoining the club from Dundalk. McNamara said that their appointments are effective until the end of the season when they will be reviewed.

The new appointees, among the longest serving players in domestic football, will have an early opportunity of assessing the problems they have inherited when they meet Dundalk in a rearranged championship game at the RDS this afternoon.

On the face of it, their challenge is substantial, for Rovers once the most feared club in the country have not scored, let alone won a game, since their 2-1 success over bottom of the table Athlone Town on December 10th.

Two prominent FAI officials, Joe Delaney and Sean Connolly, travelled to Cork yesterday for talks with interested parties following a winding up order against Cork City in the High Court on Monday.

It emerged later that a new consortium headed by Chris Herlihy, a former vice president of the club, is putting together a rescue package but it is unlikely to be in place in time to same Saturday away game against Drogheda United.

The FAI officials also met with John Hyland, a Cork accountant who has been appointed by the court to implement the liquidation, and representatives of the players, led by player manager Rob Hindmarch.

Afterwards, Herlihy said that he had put forward proposals to both the FAI and the players' representatives and they appeared to have been well received. "The first problem we have to solve is to purchase the players' contracts which are now in the hands of the liquidator," he said.

"This involves agreeing fees with the liquidator, but hopefully the problem can be resolved to everybody's satisfaction and we can keep senior football going in the city."

John Caulfield, the club captain, said that the players were ready to play against Drogheda without payment. However, as all club funds are now in the hands of the liquidator and no money's available to meet travel expenses, the likelihood is that the Drogheda game will be postponed.

Relaxed Bobby Gould completed his preparations for tonight's prestige friendly against Italy knowing all the pressure is on counterpart Arrigo Sacchi. The Welsh manager, who gives Sheffield United's Glyn Hodges his first international start in almost four years, cannot wait to get to grips with the World Cup runners up in Terni's Stadio Libero Liberate.

"We've come here to win, just as Italy have," said Gould. "The difference is the immense pressure they're under."

The return of Hodges, whose last start was against Austria in Vienna in April 1992, was among eight changes mostly enforced from the side which drew 1-1 in Albania in November.

Ian Rush and Mark Hughes are back together up front, with skipper Barry Horne returning to the midfield.