First international of the new season is on Wednesday in Cardiff. The original squad was: David Forde (Millwall FC), Keiren Westwood (Sunderland), Darren Randolph (Birmingham City); John O’Shea (Sunderland), Sean St Ledger (Leicester City), Marc Wilson (Stoke City), Seamus Coleman (Everton), Stephen Kelly (Reading), Darren O’Dea (Metalurh Donetsk), Ciaran Clark (Aston Villa), Paul McShane (Hull City); Glenn Whelan (Stoke City), James McCarthy (Wigan Athletic), Paul Green (Leeds), Jeff Hendrick (Derby County), Aiden McGeady (Spartak Moscow), Anthony Pilkington (Norwich City), James McClean (Wigan Athletic), Robbie Brady (Hull City), David Meyler (Hull City), Stephen Quinn (Hull City), Wes Hoolahan (Norwich City); Shane Long (West Brom), Conor Sammon (Derby County), Jon Walters (Stoke City), Simon Cox (Nottingham Forest). Since then, though, Forde, St. Ledger, McGeady, Pilkington (again), Quinn and Simon Cox have all withdrawn. Stephen Henderson, Paddy Madden and Andy Keogh were called up. Still no room for Kevin Doyle, and Richard Dunne hasn't sufficiently proven his fitness. Robbie Keane is rested. Hopefully it will be a good workout for the lads - the serious business vs Sweden and Austria is only a few weeks away!
Starting XI: Westwood, Coleman, Clark, O'Shea, Wilson, Walters, McCarthy, Whelan, Brady, Hoolahan, Long. Looks like a 4-4-1-1 with Hoolahan playing behind Shane Long. This is probably one of the stronger XI's Trap has fielded... Brady over McClean is the only real point of contention, and even that is highly debatable. Still, when Robbie returns for Sweden and Austria, expect us to revert to a more orthodox 4-4-2.
Wales 0-0 Ireland. Fairly uninspiring stuff, though I thought Ireland were by far the better side. We created chance after chance after chance, but couldn't take any of them, and Wales never once looked like scoring. Impressive: O'Shea, Walters, Brady... unimpressive: McCarthy. Also, Westwood did not inspire confidence.