PAT DEVLIN, the National League manager, will be demanding more of the same when he seeks to build on last week's display at Richmond Park with a win over the Welsh League in Cardiff this evening.
A 2-0 win over a team of English semi-professionals was built, primarily, on discipline at the back and the commitment of a midfield formation in which Peter Hutton filled the lead role.
Now Devlin will be looking to the enterprising Derry player to push forward and provide the requisite support for the two front men, Stephen Geoghegan and his Shelbourne colleague, Pat Morley.
Geoghegan put his name on both the goals against the English team, but Devlin acknowledges that the going is likely to be more difficult now against a Welsh side which provided abrasive competition in the corresponding game 12 months ago.
He is still awaiting fitness clearances for a couple of players but with a clean bill of health, he is likely to keep faith with the team which performed so creditably last Tuesday.
Shelbourne, who provide five members of the squad - Pat Scully, Mark Rutherford, Pat Morley and the Geoghegan brothers, Declan and Stephen - are to seek a postponement of next Sunday's FAI Cup quarter-final tie against Bray Wanderers.
They feel that the imposition of this representative game in midweek, will unfairly disadvantage them.
Given that an interval of five days separates the two games, it is not a submission which will command wide support when the FAI Cup sub-committee meets tomorrow to adjudicate on the case.
A potentially more serious problem for the FAI is the difficulty Mick McCarthy is experiencing in assembling a 13 squad for the novel fixture against the National League at Tolka Park on St Patrick's Day.
In announcing his preliminary plans for the game some time ago, he said that he did not intend to call up any of his senior players and defeat the purpose of the exercise which is designed to give some of the emerging talent a chance to impress.
He was also conscious of the fact that club managers would be loath to make some of their leading players available for a fixture of this description. Now, it looks as if those on the fringe of full international status, will also have problems getting their release as there is a full programme of English First and Second Division games arranged for March 18th and 19th.
The problem is illustrated starkly by the fact that none of the goalkeepers who fill the first four positions in the pecking order for Ireland - Alan Kelly, Shay Given, Keith Branagan and Gary Kelly - is likely to be cleared to make the trip.
Nor is that the end of McCarthy's problems, for others likely to be involved with their clubs that week and thus unlikely to be available for the Tolka Park fixture include Mark Kinsella (Charlton), Dave Savage (Millwall), Kieron Durkan (Stockport), Philip Hardy (Wrexham), David Connolly (Watford) and Dominick Foley (Wolves).
"It's causing us one or two headaches but never mind, I'll have a team in Dublin - and one that will fit the occasion," said McCarthy.
