Amid the constant moving of the goalposts to announce the next permanent Republic of Ireland head coach, John O’Shea’s managerial career gets launched against Belgium at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday.
It’s a giant leap for the 42-year-old.
Previously, and in reverse order, O’Shea has worked as an assistant coach under Wayne Rooney at Birmingham City, Stephen Kenny, Michael O’Neill (briefly) and Alex Neil at Stoke City, and Jim Crawford at the Irish under-21s, all after two years with Reading where José Manuel Gomes, Mark Bowen and Veljko Paunovic struggled in the hot seat.
None of these periods will be remembered fondly by supporters. Especially the 83-day Birmingham fiasco, although O’Shea was asked to remain on staff by Rooney’s replacement Tony Mowbray.
“That was a private conversation,” said O’Shea earlier this month. “I was having a good chat with Tony in the office and we were just talking about going forward and I said, ‘Look, hopefully I will be a manager one day’ and the next thing Tony said [to the media] ‘John is ready to be a manager’.”
But the point holds. O’Shea remains in the infancy of his chosen career. In fact, he has no experience of being out there, on his own, trying to react to the computer brains of Belgium coach Domenico Tedesco and Switzerland’s Murat Yakin.
If osmosis counts for anything, he should be fine. Alex Ferguson took a shine to O’Shea during a golden era at Old Trafford. This is the same full back cum centre half cum holding midfielder who made 446 Premier League appearances for Manchester United and Sunderland while winning 118 caps for Ireland and even captaining them at Euro 2016.
He is no mug. Neither was Kenny, O’Neill or Mick McCarthy and still, in the end, the Irish gig proved too much for these vastly experienced managers.
“Look it’s a huge, shall we say, task,” admitted O’Shea on Friday morning. “But it’s one myself, the staff and the players have said: ‘what game would you want?’ We’d want a big game, we’d want a tough task, and we have that with Belgium.
“But you have to have the belief, the plan, [and] the structure hopefully that can cause Belgium problems. But we fully respect that no matter what team or squad and team is selected, they’ve good players all over Europe playing in top leagues and that will be a challenge, but one ourselves and the players are relishing.”
Attitude has never been an issue with O’Shea, not the player and not the coach, but there is no evidence to suggest he is ready for this job.
Last year he sat behind Kenny and Keith Andrews as the walls caved in around Ireland at the Opap Arena in Athens. O’Shea witnessed how a League of Ireland career-manager like Kenny could not turn the tide when matched against Greek boss Gus Poyet and Dutch manager Ronald Koeman.
Criticism levelled at the previous coaching ticket focused on their tardy reaction to Poyet and Koeman switching formations. O’Shea’s peers, particularly Richard Dunne, Damien Delaney and Kevin Kilbane, said as much. So did Brian Kerr.
“It’s always going to happen when you win, lose or draw, the questions or criticism,” O’Shea responded. “It’s a natural thing and you have to be prepared for it and that’s what we do.
“We’ll talk about a structure, we’ll talk about a plan but ultimately if Belgium come up with a different shape we will have to adapt.
“We have to have the key personnel in place, whether we need a little break in the game to get [messages on to the pitch] as well. But also we have to trust in our players that they can solve problems initially too, and then you have your analysts with information being fed down from above.
“But if you can see it as quickly as possible from the side of the pitch, ultimately that’s the best thing.”
Correct answer. However, O’Shea did not make a comparable impact last year to Anthony Barry’s stint as Kenny’s training ground coach in 2021. He seeks a sustained future in the game but his opening night as the gaffer – not to be reawakening the ghosts of Steve Staunton – is against the fourth best team on the planet.
Belgium are missing injured superstars Kevin De Bruyne, Thibaut Courtois and Romelu Lukaku but look at Tedesco’s record.
Still only 38, the Italian-German coach is light years ahead of O’Shea in terms of hours on the job. In 2018 he took Schalke 04 to second in the Bundesliga and into the Champions League. After two years at Spartak Moscow, he got RB Leipzig to the Europa League semi-final before being fired after 38 matches.
In managerial parlance, a sacking or two is necessary before they can graduate with honours. O’Shea has never been sacked because O’Shea has never been a manager.
The Belgium job is proving to be enormously challenging for Tedesco but his public spat with Courtois, who accused him of lying this week, is offset by a strong record: eight wins and two draws in 10 games, which include defeats of Germany and Serbia, as he brings the underachieving, yet ridiculously talented Red Devils to this summer’s Euros as contenders.
Tedesco also offers a well-developed philosophy, something O’Shea needs to produce in quick time.
“I always want my teams to divide the space well,” said Tedesco in 2017. “I like to compare it to a boxer, who should never let his guard down. On top of that, we want to win the ball back as often as possible because we love attacking, although always with a certain balance and structure, to be able to control any transitions.”
When O’Shea was asked to explain how he will set Ireland up, he spoke about remembering how to win matches in Dublin again. When asked about formations he spoke about flexibility. When asked a direct question about Sammie Szmodics’s first cap, he gave nothing away.
“The main point was that we need to go win football games,” said Nathan Collins, reiterating a constant message emerging from the squad and coaches. “We’re going to do it John’s way, we’ll listen to him, his tactics and play it that way on Saturday.”
When asked if O’Shea can become the actual Ireland manager, the Brentford defender deflected.
“You might have to ask me that question next week after the two games. We haven’t played yet.”
Half the gig, O’Shea must realise by now, is to control the narrative.
Three days after Saturday night’s baptism of fire, he must outfox a coach with 18 years of experience in the dugout, having come through the coaching ranks at Grasshoppers Zurich.
Yakin, 49, has yet to last 100 games as a manager but his Basel side showed well in the Champions League before he guided Switzerland out of their group at the 2022 World Cup, only to be trounced 6-1 by Portugal.
International football is a ruthless business. The Belgium and Swiss coaches come to Dublin in need of results. Like Tedesco, Yakin’s reported tensions with star turn Granit Xhaka has him on the back foot.
O’Shea is braver than the average soul to even want a career in management. He has an opportunity to become a memorable caretaker as opposed to the forgettable stop gaps provided by Don Givens and Noel King.
Having missed calls in recent days from “Sir Alex” and Kenny, he might want to return them because any pearls of wisdom will prove vital if Belgium score early.
