Michael O’Neill went back to school in Belfast on Wednesday afternoon. He was at Campbell College watching a boys’ training session, catching up with teenagers in the Irish FA’s residential academy.
O’Neill is 56 and about to oversee his 99th and 100th games as Northern Ireland manager in World Cup qualifiers against Slovakia and Germany, a landmark pair of fixtures for any coach.
But reflection can wait as O’Neill’s eyes are on the here and now and the future.
“It’s a nice achievement, a nice thing to hold on to,” he says of the 100 number. “But if I left the job next week, I wouldn’t leave with a sense of fulfilment. I still think there’s more to achieve.”
Restlessness is a managerial quality O’Neill has never lacked. His is a mind continually searching – for players, bloodlines, formations and tactical routes to somehow make a population of under two million competitive against the likes of Germany’s 83 million. “Reality” is a word that crops up frequently in O’Neill conversations about the job.
O’Neill’s first spell in the post was from 2012 to 2020 with a short overlap at Stoke City from late 2019; his second began in December 2022 and is scheduled to run to 2027. The highs were reaching Euro 2016 and beating Ukraine in Lyon; a low was losing 3-2 in Luxembourg in 2013.
O’Neill knows this reality inside out; he knows Germany manager Julian Nagelsmann did not prepare for last month’s qualifiers by attending a Saturday double-header of Stoke-West Brom in the Championship followed by Burton Albion-Luton in League One. Which O’Neill did.
“He definitely wasn’t where I was,” O’Neill says with a laugh when asked where Nagelsmann was that Saturday.
“We don’t just pick any fixture and know there’s one of our players there. And, of course, it’s difficult to take a player out of League One on a Saturday and in midweek ask him to play against Antonio Rüdiger of Real Madrid. That’s unrealistic.
“But that’s our reality. And I think it’s important for the players to know I’m there and able to talk to them meaningfully about their games.
“I attend as many as I can. We don’t have many scouts because the reality is we don’t need many. We track 39 players across four divisions in England, two in Scotland and the MLS – which is just Paddy McNair.”
The shallow player pool is no surprise, however frustrating it can be for O’Neill.
The League One player referred to is Jamie Reid, who will be a new name to many readers unless they support Torquay United or Stevenage. Born in Devon with a Belfast grandmother, Reid is 31. He represents a strand of player familiar to the FAI: England-born, Irish grandparent. Sure enough, Reid led the line against Rüdiger and co in Cologne.
Reid did well, part of an impressive overall performance that saw Northern Ireland holding the Germans at 1-1 with 20 minutes left. Then a defensive mix-up and a Florian Wirtz free-kick transformed the night. It ended 3-1.
O’Neill has often had to scour lower league football and on Thursday recalled Josh Magennis to the squad. Magennis is now playing for third-tier side Exeter City. He is 35. It means he and Reid raise the age profile; because arguably the most notable feature of O’Neill’s second spell at Northern Ireland is generational change.
When Gareth McAuley scored that famous opening goal in Lyon at Euro 2016, he was 36, one of five starters aged in their 30s. The average age was 29. In Cologne last month Reid and McNair were the only two aged 30 or above. Half the outfield 10 were aged 23 or under. The average age was 24.8.
When O’Neill turned to his bench as players tired in the second half, three of those he brought on were Callum Marshall (20), Ruairi McConville (20) and Jamie McDonnell (21). McDonnell’s previous game had been for Mansfield Town at Lincoln City. He is another player operating in League One, albeit on loan from Nottingham Forest.
As O’Neill notes wryly, at 1-1 Nagelsmann introduced Leon Goretzka (30) of Bayern Munich.
O’Neill also mentions that Slovakia, who beat Germany 2-0 in Bratislava three days before, had six aged over 30 in their starting XI. “Slovakia have a lot of experience. They have Stanislav Lobotka, one of the best number 6s in Europe, who plays for Napoli.” Lobotka will be 31 in November.
Yet it is Irish youthfulness that excites O’Neill.
“In 2016,” he says, “we had more players in the Premier League or had been there. What’s satisfying at the moment is that I’m seeing young players in the infancy of their careers.
“You go with a different set of eyes. If you were watching Chris Brunt playing for West Brom, you know what he can do and, good or bad, he’s going to be in my squad. Now it’s almost like scouting emerging talent.”
In 2014, two years into his first tenure, O’Neill, Jim Magilton and the IFA set up Club NI, a proto-academy where the best young talent in the North could come together. Conor Bradley was one. With assistance from Uefa, that became a residential base at Jordanstown and is today at Campbell College under the guidance of former Linfield striker Andy Waterworth.
The fruits of that labour are another, growing strand in O’Neill’s squad.
“It’s down to the work of initially Jim Magilton and subsequently Andy Waterworth, they’ve done a brilliant job,” O’Neill says. “If you look at us now we have kids at Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham, Aston Villa, Nottingham Forest, West Ham. That’s a consequence of the academy and, if we’re honest, a little bit of Brexit – we’re not just patting ourselves on the back.
“We have good young players – our under-16s won the Gary Speed Cup in Wales, a new tournament. They live residentially from 14-16 and in many ways it’s what the English FA were doing years ago with Lilleshall. That might seem dated, but where we are as an association, it’s not. Lilleshall is no longer necessary because English clubs can afford their own academies, ours can’t.
“I’ll go visit the academy when I can, watch training, see how the boys are getting on. I can’t do it often, but I think it’s important I do it. I enjoy it.”
Across the island, Irish football is aware of getting ahead of itself regarding teenage talent. O’Neill is the same, but he knows the subject: he was 15 when he made his Irish League debut for Coleraine, 18 when he was transferred to Newcastle United.
“There’s a definite improvement,” he says of Irish boys. “They’re not just getting the opportunity because of Brexit. They’re still having to compete with the best kids in England. For example, we have two boys at Villa, who invest heavily in their academy. For Villa to invest in them tells you they’re of a high talent level.
“What Brexit means is there are no French 16-year-olds in English academies. But there can be from 18. So there’s a window. But there’s a definite improvement in mentality, physicality and all round in terms of what is required to be a footballer.”
Cole Brannigan and Calum Moreland, both aged 18, are the two teens at Villa, but O’Neill reels off a list and says: “I genuinely hope I am the Northern Ireland manager who can give them, Ceadach O’Neill [Arsenal], George Feeney [Tottenham], Chris Atherton [Chelsea] and others, their first international cap.
“I remember seeing Conor Bradley as part of our under-16 group. I gave Ethan Galbraith his debut. I saw Isaac Price and Shea Charles play for Club NI against Leeds United in an under-15 game. I know these lads so well and hopefully I’ve been some level of constant in their career.”
He is hardly complacent, though. He can’t be. The IFA cannot host a home game at Euro 2028 due to the Casement Park mess. O’Neill is – again – realistic when it comes to state of Irish League clubs and their economics. As a qualified financial planner who took Shamrock Rovers into Europe in 2011, he knows the week-to-week pressures of being a domestic manager.
“The League of Ireland is still ahead of the Irish League,” he says, “but there are challenges for League of Ireland clubs as well. If you’re paying 52-week wages and asking your players to train at 10am every morning, it’s a challenge to pay the necessary staff around that.
“When I went into Rovers we weren’t a full-time club, we paid the players 42 weeks a year, we didn’t have a strength-and-conditioning coach, we didn’t have analysts. I look at the club now and what Stephen [Bradley] has – but that’s funded by success.
“For me, Shamrock Rovers are by far the leading club in Ireland.”
Broad questions over the state of Irish football will narrow for O’Neill over the next week. Games 99 and 100, both World Cup qualifiers, both at Windsor Park – it’s a moment. And a man in football more than 40 years is stirred.
