There's a place in the world for a gambler. The build-up to Saturday night's fixture in the Amsterdam Arena seemed like one long and crazy series of reckless bets by the Irish. The decision to play the Netherlands away as our first fixture? Crazy! Allowing juvenile brains like Mark Kennedy and Phil Babb loose on the town? Lunacy! The inclusion of Jason McAteer? Nuts! And Richard Dunne? Get outta here!

In the end Mick McCarthy almost landed the big jackpot of a win. two goals ahead with 25 minutes left and the Irish contingent of 5,000 were swaying in their Celtic shirts and pointing out to the sulky hosts that they only sing when they are winning. Two late Dutch goals, one of them desperately unlucky from an Irish perspective, saw Ireland leave town one surprising point the richer, but wondering about the other two which got away.

There was something for everyone in the audience, but the Irish couldn't help feeling that the provisions had been taken from their pockets.

"Sort of mixed feelings about it," said Niall Quinn.

"Not sure yet. Just mixed feelings," said Roy Keane.

"You could say it was a game we could have won," said Mick McCarthy.

"The Irish toyed with us in the first half," said Dutch manager Louis van Gaal.

So. Okay. It was a game Ireland could have won. Truth is that the Dutch could have snatched it, too. The latter assertion gives credit for the influential part played by half-time substitute Clarence Seedorf, who turned in a wonderful second half for the Dutch. It also recognises the quicksilver passing movements which occasionally threatened to cut the Republic's defence to ribbons.

The Amsterdam Arena, from the outside an oppressive mound of grey concrete dropped into an industrial estate, proved itself a worthy host for such an intriguing game. Inside, the arena was a chaos of colours and blaring music, and the Dutch support - characteristically numerous, boisterous and orange-clad - accompanied their team with various brass and percussion bands posted around the stadium.

The Dutch needed the encouragement. When Ireland scored their first goal, a wondrously-devised thing involving a necklace of passes and flash of daring, the big screen showed a picture of van Gaal. The cerebral Dutchman who won everything there is to win in club football was wearing his Homer Simpson face. "Where am I and what is happening?" his expression asked.

Jason McAteer, so often a disappointment in an Irish jersey, was integral to the creation of that first goal and scored the second midway through the second half to give Ireland an unlikely cushion. Even among the Irish press corps the faces registered something familiar. "Where are we, what is happening?" the expressions said.

Indeed, there was a lot of rowing back to be done. When it was announced late on Friday night, the selection of McAteer had seemed plain wrong-headed. When word leaked out that Gary Kelly would sit on the bench on Saturday night and McAteer, with his crazy legs and occasional flashes of petulant indiscipline, would start, there were groans from almost everyone who heard the news.

McAteer and the new, young centre half Richard Dunne both made immense contributions on Saturday night and afterwards, as the team strode confidently towards their bus, it was possible to believe that at last Mick McCarthy had found an XI which would virtually pick itself for future games.

For McCarthy, this was probably the finest moment of his managerial career. There have been surprisingly good away performances against superior opposition in the past, but promise has seldom been rewarded with anything tangible. This time McCarthy presented a side which played confidently and well. They went looking for a win with an eagerness which suggested a new-found confidence running through the team.

Time will tell if Saturday night was what sportswriters like to call "a coming of age" for the Irish team. Certainly it marked a sort of beginning, not just of a new campaign but of a team with no shadows hanging over it. A few years ago McCarthy noticed that the younger players in his squad were quiet and deferential towards the older stars whom they had watched on television as they grew up. On Saturday, Quinn reported that in the aftermath it was the kids in the team who were shouting the odds in the dressingroom, roaring their view that performances like the one just submitted were needed every time.

Some transition. When McCarthy started off four years ago he had McGrath, Townsend, Cascarino, Aldridge, Irwin and Houghton, all in various states of repair and vigour to call upon. Piece by piece they broke off and McCarthy has had to blood replacements.

In the weekend's other fixtures in the group Andorra were beaten by Cyprus and Portugal beat Estonia. Ireland travel to Lisbon early next month to conclude an opening pair of games that presented the two greatest challenges in the fixture list. A large Irish contingent will be hoping for more of the same.

"There have been some great away nights with the team over the years," said Quinn afterwards, "and this has been one of the greatest."

The grin on his face told the story. He's looking forward to a few more.