REPUBLIC OF IRELAND INTERNATIONAL NEWS:DARRON GIBSON may have undermined his chances of reclaiming his place in the Ireland team after appearing to mock Giovanni Trapattoni's suggestion he might develop more as a player if he were to move away from Old Trafford in search of first-team football.
The Italian observed last week that Gibson had lost out to Paul Green in his team selection for the opening two games of the Republic of Ireland’s Euro qualification campaign because the 27-year-old was more used to having to work for the ball due to the fact he essentially plays week in week out with lesser players around him than the northerner has at Manchester United.
More than once, however, he hinted that the bigger problem is the lack of first team opportunities Gibson enjoys at Old Trafford. The 22-year-old from Derry started just 12 games for United last season and while he came on in almost as many again, Trapattoni would clearly like to see him featuring much more regularly.
On his recent visit to Dublin for the pre-season friendly against a League of Ireland selection, Alex Ferguson was at pains to talk the player’s prospects up, arguing that having chipped in with five goals last year, he could contribute much needed fire-power from midfield if given more regular run-outs.
Since the competitive action has got under way, though, the Scot has not even named the midfielder in his bench for a single game, prompting questions to Trapattoni in the build-up to the last two international games regarding what he believes might be the best way for the player to progress his career.
The manager made it clear he did not want to “tell” the player to move for fear of antagonising Ferguson but made clear his own frustration that a potentially key member of the Ireland squad was not getting the chance to play for his club and that the player could address the situation by moving in order to secure first-team football.
Asked by the Derry Journalin advance of the Andorra game about Trapattoni's observations, however, Gibson appears to have reacted with a mixture of incredulity and scorn.
In a piece run under the headline “Shut your Trap, Gio”, Gibson is quoted as asking: “Where else would I go from Manchester United? What club, other than Manchester United, could I go to to improve my game?
“To be honest,” he continues, “if he’s trying to say that I should move somewhere like Stoke City and change my game to winning tackles and not winning games, then he’s having a laugh.
“To move on from Manchester United just doesn’t make sense to me.”
The player subsequently acknowledges his lack of first-team football is an issue on the international front and accepts he was unlikely to start in Armenia because of it.
He goes on, however, to express the hope he would start against Andorra. He didn’t.
He says, however, that having shown what he was capable of for his club last year he is just waiting to get “another run in the team”.
“I have a good relationship with Trapattoni,” he insists. “We haven’t fallen out in any way. Personally, I just think I haven’t been playing (for Ireland) because I haven’t been playing regularly at club level and he’s giving other players the chance that play week in, week out.”
That, as it happens, would seem to be the manager’s point and when Gibson’s quotes were read to Trapattoni at a press conference yesterday morning prior to his return to Italy, his tone was fairly scathing.
“I said before, he’s not my player, I’m not Ferguson,” he said. “But when a young player plays more games, in the first or second league, it increases their personality. It’s not a problem, though; if Gibson wants to stay in Manchester, let him stay in Manchester. It’s not my problem.
“I will continue to ask him but I think also it’s a question of whether he plays or doesn’t play. I cannot have seven or eight players who don’t play for their club. I can’t have such a situation.
“Two other players asked me 20 days ago about opportunities to go to the second league to play and I told them to go, play. He (Gibson) says he wants to stay, that Ferguson helps him; then stay! It’s not my problem.
“But the answer is that he must play. When he stays always on the bench, obviously he is not improving. Manchester is Manchester. There are players with great personalities who play. He must enter this group. Now, he doesn’t play or plays only sometimes because there are other great players but I think that at another club he plays all the time.
“It doesn’t matter whether it is Manchester or Juventus or Milan, when you stay at these great teams it is very important because you play in the league, in Europe . . . but if you stay in this club and play only a few times, you just stay with the shirt, then that is different.
“But I didn’t say whether he should stay or go. Just that if Gibson was at another club maybe he would play 90 minutes, 90 minutes, 90 minutes and he would grow more. He has football in his head and in his legs, it’s beautiful but if he doesn’t play . . .”
Asked about his side’s winning start to the campaign, Trapattoni’s satisfaction was apparent and he said he had congratulated his players before cautioning them against overconfidence.
“I said we’d only played the first two games. Don’t be arrogant. When you become strong, the other teams try to get at you. We cannot think we are the best just because of these two games.”
