Stephen Kenny has sung the praises of new Ireland assistant John Eustace - while clarifying comments he made about English coaches while he was Dundalk manager.
Having lost Anthony Barry to Belgium, who are Ireland's opponents at the Aviva Stadium on Saturday, Kenny has turned to another English coach, QPR's Eustace, to fill the vacancy in his backroom team.
In October 2018, after Kenny guided Dundalk to a fourth LOI title in five years, he said that that Irish football had to start looking beyond England for inspiration.
“We’re too influenced by England," he said at the time. "There are no English coaches, the best is Eddie Howe.
“The rest are old school in the way they think and the way they play."
Those comments were put to Kenny yesterday as he spoke about the qualities that Eustace would bring to the Ireland set-up.
"At that time, I’m talking about head coaches who are managing teams playing in a progressive way," said the 50-year-old.
"At that time, he (Howe) was the only English manager in that division. It wasn’t a wholesale criticism of English coaches.
"Now football changes so quickly, and it evolves quickly, and we’re all learning - there's a whole new raft of English coaches who have developed and are playing in a very progressive way now.
"At that time when we looked at the Premier League, they (Bournemouth) were the only team playing in an expansive way whereas some of the other English coaches were using more of a direct style.
"You couldn’t say that now. A lot of English coaches have emerged. It wasn’t an anti-English thing.
"That was the point I made at the time. It was a broader discussion at the time. You can’t just accept that into one point.
"It was about Dundalk, Europa League and all of that. It was a broader discussion in relation to how we played then."
Kenny explained that he had got to know Eustace, 42, at matches both have attended over the last year - particularly at West Brom, as Eustace lives in Birmingham.
"I’ve seen him coaching at QPR and he has done well, so it just seemed, when I was working out who to bring in to replace Anthony, that he’d be a good candidate," the Dubliner said.
“My own relationship would be the main reason, and his reputation as a good coach.
"I've had dealings with him through QPR as well on a professional level. He's an excellent addition to the team, a highly regarded coach and he'll be a very good addition to the team.
"He’s a student of the game. We did quite a few video sessions together before he came on board.
"We interacted in relation to how they train, what his ideas are, how he feels about the game, do we connect on that level.
"He’s thought-provoking and he challenges some concepts, so he’s interesting. I feel that he’s a really good person as well, and he’ll bring a humility to the group.
"I think he’ll do a good job.”
