"Even after Armenia!"
That was the quip from Heimir Hallgrimsson after RTÉ soccer correspondent Tony O'Donoghue remarked how the Republic of Ireland manager exuded calm after the astonishing scenes in Budapest four months ago.
The Icelandic native's time in charge has been characterised by sheer peaks like that win over Hungary as well as against Portugal. But Armenia away earlier in the World Cup qualifying group would have represented a Marina Trench of troughs.
So it was perhaps no surprise that he is striking a balance between confidence and wariness with tonight's play-off semi-final against Czechia in mind.
That attitude has carried over to how he views the members of his Irish squad who are coming into their Prague mission at contrasting ends of the match sharpness charts.
All players trained at the Fortuna Arena on Wednesday morning and the manager declared himself "comfortable" with the status of the 25 call-ups.
"Everybody got through the sessions," Hallgrimsson said at Ireland's pre-match press conference.
"Those who we wanted to see doing more, we took extra, we made them do extra to see where they are and everybody has come through those sessions fine and we are comfortable with the squad that we have."
He added: "You have it in your mind, you have a gameplan if somebody hasn't played a lot of games and this game probably could go to 120 minutes, (so) you need to have a Plan B and a Plan C and all of those scenarios that could happen.
"But I’ve no problem as I’ve said probably two times in this meeting, no problem with players playing and starting, 90 minutes for me would be no question. But we would always have a Plan B and you need to take that into account if somebody hasn’t played a lot of minutes, you need a Plan B, (a) what if?"
Someone who was not even an embyronic Plan Z the last time this Irish squad gathered together in November is the newly-qualified Harvey Vale.
The former England Under-19 captain only got his switch to Ireland confirmed by FIFA days before last week's squad announcement.
But the in-form QPR player himself and the manager has not ruled out a wildcard appearance tonight.
"Obviously he is new in and getting to know the way we want to do things," Hallgrimsson said of the 22-year-old.
"We're not going to force him into something. It must be natural and comfortable both for him and for us. But he definitely has qualities that can be beneficial (tonight) and in the future, especially a young player that is still improving."
Given this play-off semi-final is a one-legged affair, the potential for the tie to be decided via a penalty shootout is a live issue.
Ireland number one Caoimhín Kelleher would appear well primed for that task on the evidence of a busy season with Brentford.
The Cork man has saved three spot kicks in the Premier League this season.
That's not counting how he denied Cristiano Ronaldo from 12 yards in Lisbon last October.
With a burgeoning CV of recent spot kick rebuttals, Hallgrimsson expressed confidence that Kelleher will rise to the occasion should that eventuality occur in Prague.
"(It's) massive, he's proven himself to be one of the best penalty-stoppers in the game," he said.
"Obviously it gives us confidence. The same, we have good takers. We’re not overly talking about this. I think it’s difficult to train for the moment, if you need to take one at the end. So we’ve just given players freedom if they want to exercise this. Otherwise we don’t talk much about it."
But in the guaranteed 90 minutes to come, Hallgrimsson is not planning to deviate markedly from the approach that has just about got Ireland this far.
"I think we all know by now why we got good results and good performances, and that's the key, not be over-ambitious (tonight), stay on point, focus on why we are here and trying to improve that, not only this game, continuously," he said.
"Then it's just tactical, being ready for what they will throw at us and do what we need to do and just remind ourselves why we are in this position, continue to grow and do the same things that we have been doing.
"That’s kind of the psychology for a game like this."
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