The call-up has come through unfortunate circumstances, but Derry's James McClean is overjoyed, writes MARY HANNIGAN
IT WAS a tale of two phone conversations with two James, McClean and McCarthy, Giovanni Trapattoni revealing at his press conference at the Aviva Stadium yesterday the joy of the former when he rang him that morning to tell him he was in his Euro 2012 squad. Before that, though, there was the pain of McCarthy, whose father’s ill health prompted him to to decide to make himself unavailable for the tournament.
“I have made the very difficult decision to withdraw my name from selection from the Euro 2012 squad following the diagnosis of my father with cancer and an ongoing requirement for treatment,” McCarthy said in a statement released yesterday.
“I have discussed this with the manager. He was very understanding and I thank him sincerely for that. I take this opportunity to reaffirm my complete commitment to playing for the Republic of Ireland. It is a huge honour and source of great pride for me and my family,” he said, going on to wish the squad the best at Euro 2012.
“It was last week he called me,” said Trapattoni. “He told me what happened in his family and I said: ‘I’m very, very sorry.’ But he’s decided to remain at home because he has a very heavy duty to his parents. I reminded him immediately that we would continue to follow him and that he will be in our plans for the future. He said: ‘Thanks for this.’
“He prefers to stay at home because, psychologically, he said: ‘I’m not ready, I’m afraid about this . . . I am sad, I am not confident about this situation.’ I have to have respect for this. I said: ‘Okay, think about the future, shortly you will be with us in the next campaign’.”
There was some debate after the press conference over whether or not Trapattoni had actually confirmed that he would have selected McCarthy for his squad. “Yes,” he said when Manuela Spinelli’s translated a query on the issue, which seemed clear cut enough, but “yes” is often just his acknowledgement that he understands the question.
No matter, McCarthy is out, McClean is in, and the manager wasn’t keen, under the circumstances, to discuss who “benefitted” from McCarthy’s withdrawal. “It’s not important, this,” he said.
“I took call from Mr Trapattoni this morning; it certainly wasn’t a bad wake-up call to get,” McClean had tweeted by then.
“He was surprised,” Trapattoni smiled. “Someone wrote in an Irish newspaper that he wasn’t in the list.”
What did you say to him?
“James, you are in our list. He said: ‘Thank you very much.’ I said: ‘I follow you, many games, many times.’ I asked him to come three, four days because we can improve him. He plays in his position at his club, with us maybe we can look at other situations. He said: ‘Thank you, I will come immediately’, May 17th.’”
(Most of the squad will join up on May 20th, but some have been asked to arrive on May 17th – mainly those with fitness concerns, or, like McClean, players Trapattoni wants extra time to work with.)
“I have followed McClean. I asked also the senior players, like (John) O’Shea, about him. He said: ‘He’s not bad, he’s good’. He has enough good personality and he is physically strong. He’s improved, also. In the first games I saw only his strength, now, for example, he scores, also from free-kicks. He has grown his personality. I think he can give us energy. When you have three games in 10 days you need options. We can play (Damien) Duff and (Aiden) McGeady and then, maybe, McClean in the second or third game can be important.”
When did he become convinced about McClean’s ability? “Maybe two months ago, he go with the ball along the line, the defender ‘thump’ (smashes hand with fist), he has again the ball, the other defender ‘tunk, tunk, tunk’. Scores. He is confident, he has belief at this moment.”
(All the while the microphones in front of Trapattoni were in danger of being sent flying across the room as he re-enacted one of the Derry man’s finer Sunderland moments this season.)
Can he play on right?
“I already spoke to him about this. There are many examples, many left-footed players playing on the right. I bought Liam Brady when he was at Arsenal, he played number seven, he played right winger. We will try James in this position when he comes in.”
Can he have the same impact in this tournament as Toto Schillaci did for Italy in 1990, another player to emerge late on?
“We buy (Alessandro) Del Piero for Juventus, he was 17 years old. He was on the bench. In the second half I said: ‘Sandro, go on pitch.’ Four minutes, 30 seconds later he scored a goal. I said ‘he will have a great career’, he was fantastic. McClean? You asked about Schillaci. May God be on his side and for him to be like Schillaci.”
Is this squad good enough to win the tournament?
“I was a young player and I was playing against the best in the world at that moment, his name was Pele. I said ‘I am dead’. And I won the game. Usually the stronger team wins, but 90 minutes is 90 minutes.”
And with the divine intervention of Toto McClean, you just never know what’ll happen.
