Repressed memories

Ouch

It remains the most painful night I can remember as a follower of the national side. The night we played Spain in the World Cup rankles, the last 11 seconds against Macedonia hurt, but nothing was as embarassing as that. Hence my trepidation regarding Saturday’s match, even though everyone else with an opinion on the national side is preaching optimism and an away win for us in Nicosia.

Anyways, the opposition…Cyprus currently find themselves 4th in Group 8, with 5 points from 6 games. Their only win came against Georgia at home, with their other points in the group coming with a draw in Tblisi, along with allowing Montenegro to salvage a point from their match in Nicosia, the home side being 2-0 up with 25 minutes to play.

Their other three games have seen defeats to the top three sides in the group, including a 1-0 defeat at Croke Park, although they were worth a draw given the chances they had as we sat deeper and deeper towards the end. Italy required a late, late winner in Cyprus to open their qualification campaign, while Bulgaria didn’t kill them off in Sofia until a 94th minute Dimitar Makriev goal made it 2-0. So, although it doesn’t look that impressive thus far, they haven’t been humiliated by anyone in the group so far, and 5 points could (maybe should) be 9. Having said that, they come into this game off the back of a 6-1 defeat to Albania in a recent friendly out in Tirana, which hopefully has instilled doubts within the squad. Which leads me on nicely…

My poor grasp of Greek unfortunately disqualifies me from finding out who is in the panel to play us and Montenegro a few days later, but going off the basis of the squad for the Montenegro qualifier in July, and going back to that side from the 5-2, we might be able to draw a few conclusions.

The core of the side who pulled our pants down that night remain, especially in the front two lines. Antonis Georgallides is the first-choice ‘keeper, replacing Michalis Morfis from the Euro 2008 campaign. I’m not even going to pretend I can tell you what he’s like as a stopper, the best I can offer is that he went walkabouts for our winning goal in Croker back in October.

The defence also looks reshaped from the 5-2 three years ago, with a relative scarcity of appearances between the back four. Most experienced is South African-born Elias Charalombous (42 caps), who was a substitute three years ago, a starter in Croker. He was joined on the latter of the two by Marios Elia (38 caps, 1 goal), Andreas Constantinou (7 caps) and Alexandros Garpizis (35 caps, 1 goal). Again, it’s all Greek to me as far as they’re concerned, although if I remember back to October, they all seemed solid enough, although somewhat powerless to prevent Aiden McGeady when he felt like running at them.

The midfield has undergone some surgery since 2006 as well. Cyprus started with three in midfield back in Nicosia, which evolved into a more defensive flat four for the visit last year. The only survivor in the midfield between those two matches was Constantinos Makrides (43 caps, 2 goals), although Garpizis played and scored in the first match, while he was used as a defender in the second game. Otherwise, say hello to Demetris Christofi (9 caps, 2 goals, by trade a forward), Christos Marangos (14 caps, 1 goal) and Lambros Lambrou (35 caps, usually a defender). As a side-note, at some point during the match, Jason Demetriou may make an appearance for the home side, almost certainly off the bench if he does. A point of potential interest for you lot, because Demetriou, born in Newham, London, is only one of two players in the side to play for a non-Cypriot side, in his case League One Leyton Orient (For anorak purposes, fellow midfielder Marios Nicoulaou of Greek side Panionos is the other, so now you know!)

Whether coach Angelos Anastasiadis chooses to maintain the conservative midfield four, or go for the attacking three remains to be seen. Part of me wants to see the attacking three, although it accounted for us back on that infamous night. Assuming Duff and McGeady start for us, a three-man midfield might allow the central pairing to assume some sort of control over the centre of the park, maybe giving the wingers freedom to have a go at the defence, especially when the three push forward to support attacks. If Cyprus go for four in the middle, it could be an entirely different story.

Up front, there’s room for concern. The 5-2 saw Efstathios Aloneftis (32 caps, 7 goals) as part of the three-pronged strikeforce, but of far greater interest for the defence will be the duo of Michalis Konstantinou and Ioannis Okkas. Konstantinou, scorer of two goals in October 2006, is the all-time leading scorer for the Cypriots, heading for the twilight of a career which has taken in spells at Panathanaikos and Olympiakos, along with rumoured interest from the likes of West Ham United and Queens Park Rangers at certain points.

Okkas, with trials at Blackburn Rovers, Derby County and West Ham to his name, has never been a prolific goalscorer, save for a spell early in his career with Cypriot club Anorthosis Famagusta, but he has also played for Olympiakos, also taking in a brief period with Celta Vigo in Spain’s Segunda Division. He also has a tendency for the big occasion, with goals against France and Germany amongst the 22 he has for his country in 89 appearances. A decent pairing up front, if far from spectacular, we could do with a solid performance from Villa’s new boy Richard Dunne and whoever occupies the second centre-back role, given the doubts raised about Sean St. Ledger’s availability, further thrown into the doubt by the calling up of Paul McShane as cover/potential replacement.

All things told, Cyprus are one of those niggly sides which should be beaten. We all know it, our record against them suggests we should win, and the optimism going into the game is refreshing, given the importance of the tie. However, their record at home also deserves credit. 45 years of qualification matches have seen victories against Spain, Northern Ireland, Switzerland, Wales and of course, us. Throw in draws against Italy, Czechoslovakia, Germany and Denmark, and you have a respectable record in the Antonis Papadopoulos stadium in Larnaca.

If we fall behind early, it will make things very tricky, given the home record along with a crowd who can make things awkward. Assume an early advantage however, and the stadium will begin to feel as empty as it will probably look, so an early goal is all-important. If not that, then we should just do what we can to get three points, get out of Cyprus and hopefully see the back of the place for many, many qualifying campaigns to come. A win here all but guarantees us second, if perhaps not a play-off spot, (Again, I refer back to the awful system of the ‘worst’ runner-up from the nine groups failing to make the play-offs, a concept which has gone practially unnoticed) which will allow us to have a run at Italy in the final two games. The Italians go to Tblisi on Saturday night, a fixture Keith Andrews tried to dress up as a banana skin for the world champions in a press conference yesterday, but frankly, if they’re failing to win against a Georgian side who we took six points off, God help them when they get to South Africa…

Predictions? We’ll make it as tough for ourselves as we usually do, but I get the impression we might just eke out a victory. I’m going for 1-0, with Kevin Doyle scoring and mocking my protestations that he’s not an international calibre, with us sitting back and holding on for the last 20 minutes or so while Cyprus try and blow the door down, as it were. That or we get done 6-3 or 7-4 this time around, because too much optimism is clearly dangerous for me….

I might do a liveblog of the game on Saturday night, I’ll see how things are faring out on the evening. If I decide to, I will let you know at some point tomorrow, if not, expect to see a review of the match on here Monday if we get something out of the game. Otherwise, expect to see a foul-mouthed, dreadfully written toxic diatribe against all things Irish, Italian and Cypriot some time around Thursday when I’ve recovered some of my sensibilities…here’s to hoping we don’t see that nonsense.

Until Saturday, all the best everyone.