Mick McCarthy signs a new two-year contract as national team manager in Dublin today, in the knowledge that his protracted honeymoon with the Irish football public is now over. After his inability to deliver the results needed to qualify Ireland for a third consecutive appearance in the World Cup finals, he cannot be unaware of the consequences of failure in the next European Championships.

One of the legacies of the Jack Charlton era in which McCarthy, himself, was one of the more influential personalities, is that football now runs a close second to the economy in terms of expectation in this country.

That, many would say, is wholly unrealistic and no country with such a small population base, can hope to trade indefinitely with the rich and the powerful in the most competitive of all sporting arenas.

Public opinion doesn't always take account of such logic, however, and the reality is that McCarthy is now headed for an increasingly pressurised situation as he seeks to complete the transition from the Charlton years.

After being drawn in a World Cup group which was, by some way, the weakest in the European section of the competition, failure to make the cut for France '98, as the best of the second-placed teams, was a bitter pill to swallow for the team's supporters.

McCarthy's ability to build from that disappointment and impact on the preliminaries of a championship which, traditionally, has been even more difficult in its early stages than the World Cup, will depend on the mood of many over the next two years.

That he should be afforded another term to finish the job is no more than right. After inheriting a squad in decline, he has, unquestionably, lowered the age profile and introduced youngsters whose career prospects were limited under the old regime.

Equally valid, however, is the criticism that his first term as Ireland manager was occasionally flawed by naive strategies and doubtful team selections. Despite his protestations to the contrary, there is little doubt that the play-off against Belgium was lost at Lansdowne Road where he required half an hour to marshal his midfielders correctly.

And his intransigence in refusing to summon Paul McGrath for emergency service at a stage when it was difficult to place a price on the Sheffield United player's experience, put him on a collision course with a significant segment of the public.

McCarthy will argue, with some justification, that his predecessor would have taken exactly the same decision. Two wrongs have never made a right, however, and the evidence was all too obvious over both legs of the ill-fated Belgian tie.

McGrath has now almost certainly played his last game in a record-breaking career for Ireland, but if the personalities change, the underlying problem for the manager will remain constant in the New Year.

Within hours of World Cup elimination in Brussels, Andy Townsend, Ray Houghton and Tony Cascarino had all expressed misgivings about their futures in international football. To his credit, McCarthy acted quickly in this instance and, after talking with the trio, was able to announce that they had agreed to make themselves available until the end of the season.

That is an option which he will do well to utilise. Dispensing with the old in the cause of integrating the new has always been an exercise fraught with hazard and McCarthy will do well to ponder the lessons of the McGrath episode.

Ultimately, however, his salvation will rest in the hands of the younger school of players and to this end, he will be monitoring progress reports of the injured Norwich City striker, Keith O'Neill.

O'Neill's absence was, I believe, a significant contributory factor in Ireland's World Cup eclipse at a time when the manager urgently needed additional front-line options. Now it remains to be seen how quickly he can get back playing again at the level which impressed so many in his early international appearances.

Mark Kennedy's inconsistency and Gareth Farrelly's inability to mature as quickly as had been anticipated were other disappointing aspects of the campaign and the hope is that in each instance, that early promise will flower more abundantly in the New Year.

Two other midfielders whom McCarthy will surely watch in the spring are Graham Kavanagh and Mark Kinsella. Kavanagh, a fine international competitor in the under21 team, saw his career wander off course in a series of events which led to his transfer from Middlesbrough to Stoke City.

Out of that unlikely move, however, has come the inspiration for one of the more reassuring success stories of the season and his recent form with the Potteries, for whom he has already scored eight times this season, suggests that his first senior cap may not be too distant.

Like Kavanagh, Kinsella is a product of the famous Home Farm nursery and again like the Stoke player, he has been regularly on target from midfield over the last three months. His is a talent which has been touted for some time and now the moment may be opportune to give him an opportunity to express it.

McCarthy, nothing if not active in his first two years at the helm, has been to watch both players and it may well be that he will choose to deploy them in the "B" international which he is targeting for Dublin in February.

Last March, the National League provided the opposition for his players at this level. Now efforts are being made to persuade the Scots to send a team for a fixture which, it is felt, can be mutually beneficial.