MICHAEL O’Neill hopes Conor Bradley will remain around the Northern Ireland squad as their World Cup play-off date with Italy nears.
It is just eight weeks until O’Neill’s men face the four-time world champions in Bergamo. Should Northern Ireland win that March 26 play-off semi-final, they would face another away day against either Wales or Bosnia-Herzegovina for a World Cup spot.
That daunting task was made all the more difficult when captain Bradley suffered a season-ending injury in Liverpool’s 0-0 draw with Arsenal earlier this month, and the Aghyaran man has since undergone surgery on his injured knee.
O’Neill admitted losing Bradley was “a huge blow” but hopes that – subject to approval from Liverpool – the 22-year-old could be part of the party travelling to Bergamo.
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“The one thing about Conor is he’s had the captaincy, he is very much part of the group,” said the Northern Ireland boss, speaking at the launch of the Sport 4 Peace project in Belfast on Wednesday.
“Yes, he does play for the biggest club. Yes, he does have the highest profile. But if you walked into our hotel, you wouldn’t think that - you’d just think ‘well, he’s one of the guys, he mixes really well’.
“Conor is a big part of our squad. The only thing that we can take is, obviously, it’s far from the game; it didn’t happen the weekend before the game, for example.
“And ironically, for us, it’s probably the area of the pitch where we’ve got most options in terms of players who play in the Championship or play in the Premier League on that side of the pitch.
“Had it happened on the other side of the pitch, we would maybe be a little bit more exposed.”
Whether Northern Ireland can pull of the Italian job and inch closer to this summer’s extravaganza remains to seen.
But O’Neill has no doubt the experience of this campaign will be of huge benefit when sights eventually turn to the 2030 World Cup, which is being co-hosted by Spain, Portugal and Morocco, with the opening three matches played in Uruguay, Argentina and Paraguay to mark the competition’s 100th anniversary.
“A lot of our lads have played together from a young age, it’s a great group to work with. They have given me very little problems, and they enjoy being there - it’s a real pleasure to work with these lads.
“They’ve come a long way. A lot of those players, they’re in their third season of first team football, and they’ve already played a lot of international football in those three years as well, the likes of [Pierce] Charles, Isaac Price, for example, [Justin] Devenny coming in.
“We’re seeing the emergence of Ruairi McConville as well, people like that. That’s a positive. I genuinely believe our team is going to get better; we’re on a curve here and we’re only at the start of it.
“The thing is that the World Cup comes around every four years. These players who are now 20, 21, they’ll be 24, 25. It’ll be a different profile, they’ll be in a different part of their career when we come to tackle this again in 2030.”