John O'Shea provides snapshot of bright future for Ireland

John O'Shea offered the Ireland fans a glimpse of what the future could be like if the former Manchester United man was handed the permanent position as national team manager.

Taking on the world number four ranked side – albeit in a friendly international – O’Shea sent out a side capable of competing against a superior side, while offering instruction on how to also pose a threat against quality opposition.

The opening minutes of the contest offered an early insight into the thinking behind the man who has only been working in assistant roles up to last night’s fixture.

A starting eleven not too dissimilar to what went before during the Stephen Kenny era, with Sammie Szmodics the only real addition to the set-up, and continued the team’s trait of trying to play ball and work it out from defence.

O’Shea’s side, however, appeared to have a touch more of that old school directness to the play, while also testing the players to prove themselves a bit more on the competitive front.

Evan Ferguson had no more than a 50:50 chance of taking control of possession and building an attack when Robbie Brady popped that ball into his feet with less than five minutes on the clock.

And while the big striker may be lacking confidence in front of goal, there were no issues with his touch, technique and tenacity as he held off two defenders to gain control and lay the ball off perfectly for Josh Cullen.

Seconds later Ireland should have had the ball in the back of the net, however, on this occasion, Chiedozie Ogbene chose the wrong option, attempting to beat the keeper at his near post rather than square a simple ball to Seamus Coleman, who was arriving like a train, unmarked in front of an empty net.

There also appeared to be less emphasis on