LOCKERROOM:Of course we're delighted the boys beat Cyprus but the style of football left a lot to be desired

I USED to think those immense screens which the Irish team arrange around their training ground in Malahide were to protect their privacy and to save their darling faces from getting chapped by the salty winds. I know now that the local residents asked for the screens to be put up. Malahide is a scenic place after all. Nobody needs to stand at their front window and see millionaires hoofing the ball around, defacing the beautiful game.

Let’s bow to the orthodoxy of political correctness here and state first up that, yes, yes, yes, we are indeed glad that Ireland won on Saturday night. From this pencil jockey’s point of view, covering a World Cup without Ireland in it is invariably less stressful and less time-consuming and reminds us of the world Cups we used to watch on telly as kids. World Cups were all better when I was a kid. Still, you long for another day like the Italy game in Giants Stadium, one glorious aria will make up for all the tedious press conferences and precocities, for a relief from the inevitable submission of pieces which beg for headlines containing the letters FAI and the word fiasco.

Yes, yes, yes we were glad the boys won but we felt a little sorry for Cyprus and a little embarrassed at all the high-fiving and hugging which our fellas indulged in at the final whistle. We had just struggled to beat a team who play only in their local leagues and who had a bearded pony-tailed midfielder who had just done his best work since being an extra in Pirates of the Caribbean. We’d just beaten Cyprus in what is known to experts as the Italianate style and to the rest of us as the style of being jammy. We had displayed the imagination and flair of a pocket calculator.

Yes. I was glad we won and yes I would rather wake up with Brian Cowan whispering sweet nothings into my ear about Nama than waste another minute of my life wondering about the wretched Stephen Ireland, but on Saturday night I have to tell you I had a craving for a little bit of Andy Reid. I wished he wasn’t in Sunderland getting another gold star at weightwatchers but out there in Nicosia maybe putting what we sportswriting lyricists like to call an “educated” left foot on the ball and essaying a pass which didn’t reach thin air before coming down again.

I hankered for Reid and forgive me I longed for a little of Geezer Carsley. I remember when Mick McCarthy first named Carsley in a panel years ago he was labelled slightly jovially by Mick as a bald headed fella, a bit of a journeyman but tough. That was then. These days I think of him as our lost Steven Gerrard.

And Rory Delap. Wherefore art thou Rory? Poor Delap never seemed to get a fair twist in an Irish set-up but now that we are reduced to hoofing it why not have a man who can hoof it from throw-ins as well.

The entire Trapattoni era reminds me of one of my favourite films growing up, a wonderful cycling/coming of age movie called Breaking Away. It’s a story of class rivalry and growing up and a bicycle race and takes place in a little town in Indiana. Sort of The Outsiders with sunshine and a happy ending. No need for us to pedal through the whole plot save to say that Dave ( who was played charmingly by a young fella called Dennis Christopher, never heard of him again so maybe he wasn’t as charming as I recall) the lead character is obsessed with all things Italian from his Masi bike to the practice of wooing young wans by means of serenading. He has a dog whom he renames Fellini and basically his reverence for all things Italian is a running gag which works very well. Then the Italians come to race and they aren’t as charmed by Dave as he is by them. He’s a small-town working class boy. They are a different species blessed with the glamour DNA.

One of them sticks a bicycle pump between Dave’s spokes. End of infatuation. In the matter of Giovanni we are pretty much like Dave. So grateful are we to be serenaded by such a charismatic man that in our heads all things Italian are wonderful. We will call our dogs and our children Fellini if he so wishes.

We will listen with charmed smiles on our faces to his proud struggles with English which leave us warmed but poorly informed. We will call him Il Trap and ask him questions with an almost cringing reverence which we would never offer to a home-grown manager. And we will watch our side stink out the place in stagnant soccer backwaters and say, ah tis the Italian way, ya see. Sure three points are three points. Grazi, grazi.

But like Big Jack before him and increasingly in the style of Big Jack’s teams, the methods of Il Trap suggest that he either underestimates us or he doesn’t understand us any more perfectly than we understand him. He has more faith in his system than he does in our players. Does nobody else long for a little freedom of expression, for some poetry instead of textbook prose.

There is no doubt that thus far Trapattoni has proven himself to be a lucky manager. Things fall right for him. From a war which allowed us play Georgia in Germany to a gift of a penalty in Croker against the Georgians to a soft Italian sending-off in Bari. Berbatov didn’t face us in Croker. Even the Cypriots best striker Aloneftis managed to injure himself in the warm-up on Jones Road. Trap will argue that the harder he works the luckier he gets and we won’t quibble but all this luck and the efficacy of his football conservatism should be weighed against the backdrop of what is easily the weakest of the European World Cup Qualifying groups.

We have played against our nature all through and played within our capabilities. We have picked players inferior to comrades who have been left at home. It will be wonderful if we qualify for South Africa but I miss Irish sides having a little bit of genius and spark to them. I want a bit more swash for the buckle, more derring for the do, more gung for the ho. I want to be thrilled like a fan again not quietly pleased like an auditor.

I would love if the Italians came to Croke Park and we set about them the way Roy Keane set about the Dutch in Lansdowne when we were on our way to making the 2002 World Cup. Zero respect and a passion that forces your backside out of the seat. A little romance.

But we are besotted. Winning means never having to say sorry for boring us rigid. We scored a late goal on Saturday against a Cypriot defence which looked about as sound and reliable as an Irish bank and all the dross that had gone before was forgotten. So it will be if we make South Africa.

Two games left. The world champions in Croker next month. Hey! The Italians are coming! The Italians are coming! We can’t play Italy in the style of Italy. Surely not. Let your hair down Giovanni. Make Croker heave and roar like it did yesterday. Absorb some hurling. Some of the best of football.

A little Munster rugby. Understand us and the mad passionate genius we have when it comes to sport. And then give it a lash Trap!