As Martin O'Neill's rather odd contract situation drags on, anybody heeding the advice of John Hartson would put a pen in front of the Irish manager immediately.
O'Neill signed Hartson at Celtic, and the Welshman speaks incredibly highly of his former manager.
Hartson was in Dublin yesterday to promote eir Sport's Europa League coverage, and when chatting about our World Cup qualifying group, Hartson believes that Wales will take some stopping. He praised Wales' ability to break down a Moldova side sitting deep and seemingly content for a draw (prefacing these words with the fact that Wales are usually a counter-attacking team) while admitting that Ireland have a trump card: their manager.
Hartson waxed lyrical on O'Neill, before revealing some fantastic detail of how O'Neill motivated his players at Celtic:
It's a difficult group. Wales will have the utmost respect for the Republic of Ireland because Martin O'Neill's teams are difficult to beat. He sets them up difficult to beat. And he's a genius. The result against Germany, the result against Italy, your win against Bosnia - only Martin produces these types of things. He really, really is...I think he's a genius. I don't care whether you print it. I'm not doing it to appease my ex-boss. I have that opinion of the man. I think he's incredible - what he demands, what he gets out of every single player.
Q: How could you see them playing in his way?
He just gets extra from every player. That fear of letting him down. That fear of being the one that doesn't quite achieve for him...
Q: How did he persuade you to come around to that way of thinking?
He just makes it simple. Martin O'Neill used to say to me, 'John, today son, when the ball comes in to you, I want you to do two things'...this is how he talked to all the players.
He says 'Put your foot on the ball for me - that would be very nice of you', he said, 'Stick that big arse of yours - because it's getting fucking bigger by the way - into the defender...if you could possibly, please, just for me today, give it to a green and white shirt, please, and get yourself in the box - that's all you've got to do.
Don't have 10 million things in your mind when the ball is coming into you - 'Am I going to flick it? Am I going to play it first time?' Put your fucking foot on that ball, allow us as a team to come up the pitch, hold a few off like you do - that's why I fucking paid 6 million pounds for you, son - this is what you do'.
This is Martin talking to me in front of the whole dressing room. 'And if you could just give it to a Celtic shirt'. And I said 'Is that all I've got to do? Really?
Of course he wants me to get in the box, he wants me to get across defenders, he wants me to win my headers, he wants me to bring people into play but that was my instructions. And he'd tell everyone the same. He'd tell Neil Lennon: 'Don't hit 40/50 yard passes. Give it 5 yards. Do what you're good at, son. You never score a goal. You never make a fucking goal - just give it 4 yards'.
Very Clough, very Clough.
Fantastic.
eir Sport will be broadcasting all six of Dundalk’s Europa League group games on a free-to-view basis. This means that customers on eir Vision, Sky TV & Vodafone TV will have access to the eir Sport 1 channel on their respective platforms and will get to enjoy eir Sport’s exclusively live coverage of Dundalk’s Europa League journey completely free of charge.
The 6 channel eir Sport pack includes ei Sport 1, eir Sport 2, BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2, BT Sport ESPN and the BT Sport Europe channel. The eir Sport Pack is available on eir Vision, on the eir Sport App, on Vodafone TV and on Sky in the Republic of Ireland. eir broadband customers can receive the eir Sport pack for free.
Picture credit: Barry Cregg / SPORTSFILE
