Republic of Ireland defender Dara O'Shea believes that the next permanent Ireland manager should be someone who "understands Irish football".
O’Shea’s namesake John is poised to take charge of the Ireland team for his second game as interim manager against Switzerland at the Aviva Stadium this evening.
The FAI have pledged to have a new full-time boss in situ by next month but with Lee Carsley ruling himself out of the running, the identity of that manager is still no clearer.
Suggestions that interim manager O’Shea could be offered the job on a more permanent basis continue to swirl and with the players speaking positively of the impact that he and his backroom staff have had this week, a positive result this evening would do his chances no harm.
While Burnley defender O’Shea stopped short of calling for the former Manchester United star to get the job, he listed a set of criteria that he believes necessary for the role, all of which the elder O'Shea would fit.
"I think us as a group, we just want somebody who understands Irish football and who knows what it is," he said.
"Obviously the manager here has probably the best experience in that sense. He has played so many times for this country and has worked under great managers, great Irish managers too, so there is a lot to take from that as well.
"We are quite a young group and we want to learn, so we want someone who is going to teach us, bring us along the way. Hopefully there is a lot of good that can come from this group in the future.
"Look, we just want to play for our country and do the best we can and obviously at the end of the day it’s not our decision who the manager is, so we have to crack on with that.
"But, yeah, we want to win games and represent our country as best we can and that’s all we can do from our perspective."
O’Shea also spoke highly of the backroom team. Paddy McCarthy, Glenn Whelan and Brian Kerr have all stepped to aid the interim manager and the defender fells that the change from the Kenny regime have been a smooth one.
"It’s been quite refreshing," he said. "It’s been a really enjoyable week for us as players, I think everybody else would say that in the group, the backroom staff that he has brought in have fitted in really nicely and it’s been quite seamless, it’s like they’ve been here a while and again it’s been really easy to learn off them too.
"The information they’ve given on the training pitch and before the game and after has been really easy to take on board and for us as players, we’re really enjoying what he’s brought this week."
Follow a live blog on Republic of Ireland v Switzerland this Tuesday from 7.30pm on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to commentary on RTÉ 2fm's Game On
