Roy Keane: We are more than a match for Serbia

Roy Keane insists that the loss of James McCarthy and doubts about the fitness of John O'Shea and Seamus Coleman will not be too great a concern as Ireland head to Serbia on Saturday ahead of their opening game of the new World Cup qualifying campaign.

“It’s not ideal,” he says, “but every time we come together with the international set-up, there are situations that are not ideal. Lads will be coming on the back of carrying knocks, lads who haven’t played much football – we have had a few of them over the last few years.

“But what we have found is that every time we have asked any of the players involved in the squad to go out and do a job for Ireland; they have never let us down.”

In any case, he says, “we have got a few days to play with, so we are hopeful. I think Sheasy will be fine. The big question mark would be over Seamus and we will have a better idea, certainly if there is no reaction and after the flight, over the next 48 hours.”

The management team will, he says, do a fair bit of work with the players on Serbia over the next couple of days too but he acknowledges that the game is a tough way to start the campaign although that will be the case for both sides.

“They’ve a new manager but the thing that really jumps out at you is that they have some very good players,” he says. “People say that they’re missing one or two [Nemanja Matic and Aleksandar Kolarov are suspended] but we’re missing one or two as well. So it is the start of another difficult campaign, against a good team away from home.

“It’s always going to be difficult, but as much as I’d like to praise Serbia and say they have some very good players, I’d like to say that so have we. It’s going to be a very tough game, physically it’s going to be a tough game and technically they have some very good players playing at a very high level, at some very good clubs but that’s what we’re in the game for. That’s what makes us breathe and it’s what we are looking forward to; bring it on.”

Asked about whether there might be younger players added to the squad as the campaign progresses, Keane suggested that it up to those hoping to make the step up to senior squad to prove their worth with the former Manchester United star appearing, in particular, to put it up to Jack Byrne to delivering on all of the hype.

“Well, we hope so but that’s up to the players,” he said. “That won’t be dictated by what I say. We just hope that these young players will continued to get regular first-team football whether it be [Eoghan] O’Connell or [Callum] O’Dowda [the players referenced in the question].

“That would help greatly in terms of getting to the international team, particularly the lads who are playing at the higher level, in Champions League football; there are only benefits to that.

“You say we are the oldest squad but we are also the most experienced. What helps us is the experienced lads who are still around and if you think for one second that they are just going to be giving up their position in the squad or the starting 11 for some young player who is coming through then you are sadly mistaken. That’s what we want; we want competition, we want young players coming through. We’ll watch the under-21s tonight but we’re still waiting for one or two players from that group to kick on despite one or two players building reputations before they’ve kicked a ball.

“These players have got to go and earn it. We’re not going to be picking young players for the Irish senior team because they’ve built a reputation yet they haven’t kicked a ball yet.”