'Irish football will be in a better place because of Stephen Kenny'

Ruaidhri Higgins is in no doubt that Irish football will see the fruits of Stephen Kenny’s labour in years to come.

The Derry City boss was questioned on his former manager earlier this week following the Euro 2024 Qualifying loss to the Netherlands at the Aviva Stadium, a defeat which adds to questions surrounding Kenny’s future as Republic of Ireland boss. The FAI announced today that Kenny will remain in charge for the remaining qualifiers as well as a scheduled friendly game against New Zealand.

But Higgins, who played under Kenny at Derry City and Dundalk and who has worked with him as a coach at Oriel Park and as Opposition Analyst and Chief Scout for the National team, believes that while results have been disappointing in the present, Kenny’s work with the Republic will certainly be seen in the future.

“I had a feeling this would come up, but I don't want to get drawn into it because I obviously think extremely highly of Stephen,” he explained. “He's been single-handedly the biggest influence in my career. Both as a player, as a coach of the manager. He's been an amazing mentor to me. So, one thing I'm certainly not going to do is sit here and get taken down a road I don't want to go down.

“What I would say is Irish football, in the future, will be in a better place given the amount of young players that have come into the squad, the amount of young players that he’s exposed to huge international matches.

“And I know he's coming under a lot of criticism. But what I think down the road, we'll see the huge benefit of what's happening in the last couple years, I know results haven’t been great, but Irish football will be a better place down the road.”