THE potential of an all-Ireland play-off decider looms large after the dust finally settled on the Euro 2020 qualifiers – but Northern Ireland boss Michael O’Neill he is only concerned with getting past Bosnia first.
Northern Ireland face a trip to Sarajevo on March 26, while on the other side of Path B the Republic of Ireland travel to Slovakia. The winners of those two semi-finals meet on March 31.
The prospect of a potential showdown between Northern Ireland and the Republic in such a key game would generate huge interest, but O’Neill’s sole focus is on Bosnia – a country with whom they share some recent history after two Nations League meetings last year.
The Bosnians won both those games, 2-1 at Windsor Park and 2-0 in Sarajevo, an Edin Dzeko double doing the damage in October last year.
“We played Bosnia in the Nations League, we should have beaten them at home and we were unfortunate to lose in Sarajevo so the experience of being there will help us,” said O’Neill in the wake of Wednesday night’s chastening 6-1 dead rubber defeat to Jogi Low’s Germany.
“Hopefully we will have a double-header in March, but we have to get past Bosnia and that means we have to keep Dzeko and [Miralem] Pjanic quiet as they are key to their performance.
“Overall this has been a good campaign for us... 13 points, there's no shame in that in a group with Germany and Holland. For many of our players this is their first campaign and they can only learn from nights like tonight.
“It's very difficult to come here, you never want to be beaten like we were beaten but we don't have the depth in our squad to deal with back-to-back games against nations of this level.”
Putting that defeat behind them, the Ballymena man doesn’t expect there to be any hangover by the time March 26 comes around.
Indeed, O’Neill feels that, as long as Northern Ireland are restored to full strength, they have every chance of making it to a second European Championships in-a-row alive.
“We played tonight and probably had three of our first choice back four missing, with Jamal [Lewis] and Jonny [Evans] and Stuart Dallas, who played in the game against the Netherlands, and ultimately against this level of opposition, unfortunately we weren't able to deal with it.
“We're asking players to step up from League One, players who are not playing regularly for their clubs, to come in and play against a giant of European football and some of the top emerging players.
“If we have a full squad I believe we can beat Bosnia come March. If we're five/six players down it's very difficult to progress to the finals, it's as simple as that. We have a 25-man squad and we don't really have players outside of that. We have two injured players in Jordan Jones and Conor Washington but outside of that there's no players really pushing to be part of that squad.
“You can only play with the players you have. I would love to be able to play the way Jogi does. I can't do so we have to be realistic.
“The players will learn both from the Nations League campaign and this campaign and the new players we have introduced have certainly been developing in his campaign as well. But when you get to the play-off it's not about style of play, it's about getting through, as simple as that.
“You're not going to beat a team like Bosnia through style of possession, you're going to have to fight first of all to get past Bosnia and then the winner of the Republic versus Slovakia.”
