Madam, - Despite last Saturday's shambles in Basel, it is clear from last Monday's Irish Times that the "love-in" between Brian Kerr and your newspaper's sports staff shows no sign of abating. Everyone, it seems, is culpable for the Irish team's spiritless and leaderless performance, except the manager.
Kerr is apparently responsible for reinvigorating the Irish team after Mick McCarthy's departure but not accountable for our performances against the two good teams in the group. Tom Humphries even refers to "the task Brian Kerr was asked to take on".
This makes it sound as if Kerr was doing us a favour when he took the job. The facts, I am afraid, do not sit easily with this. Brian Kerr very much wanted the job and he is being handsomely paid for his troubles.
Nobody doubts that Kerr inherited a difficult task when he became manager, but he should be judged by the same criteria as his predecessors, namely results. So far, he has shown he can compete favourably with middle-ranking sides such as Georgia and Albania but not with good teams such as Switzerland and Russia.
Brian Kerr may yet prove himself as a manager at full international standard, but until such time as he gains the same levels of success as his predecessors, your sports department should dispatch the sycophancy to the dustbin and judge him on results. - Yours, etc.,
KEVIN KENNY, Chirnside, Berwickshire, Scotland.