McCarthy suffers fresh injury with hamstring tear

If we don't give a top show against West Ham who are just returning to form the knives will be out and the players and manager will really start to feel the pressure.

Something seems not right after our flying start.

On McCarthy you say:

"He's the only 'nasty' player we have that shows any aggression "

Barry, Besic, Williams, Funes Mori, even Coleman are fairly aggressive are they not, and Barry can be nasty if he needs to be.

He came back, trained for 5/6 days, a short cameo against City, then at some stage over next week, pulls a hamstring in training. How can that be possibly be attributed to the Irish? He arrived fit, not match fit but left fit, further along in his recovery with match time under his belt. If he was struggling when he returned, he should have been managed properly with proper recovery. Do we have a Cryotheraphy chamber like Leicester?

Hamstring injury in training six days after playing against City with no reaction to his groin problem, sounds like overtraining to me. Hard sprinting with tired muscles causes thus type of injury. If he was 'killed' by the Irish, why oh why didn't Koeman go easy with him in training? We will need him fit when Idrissa goes to the AfCon in January.

By the way, where's the quotes or links to this story?

I googled it and the "killing" thing seems to be from two weeks ago. Might we be jumping the gun here?

Can you put up a link to the older story?

McCarthy

Koeman is saying that McCarthy probably felt under pressure to play.

I do think it was madness for O'Neill to play him for almost the entirety of the two games in the space of three days when he was just coming back. I agree with Koeman that O'Neill has shown a lack of respect to Everton.

Let's hope Everton have learned from this and next time we tell Ireland to feck off if any of our players are in doubt.

I thought he had played his way into our starting line up at Turf Moor, and was perplexed as to his omission. Our loss.

He was cool, assured, showed great technique and buried it giving the keeper no chance.

Thankfully, we've got loads of players like that so could afford to loan him out.

What?

Apologies for my 'semi' rant in 13 above. I was mislead. Hopefully this will allow Tom Davies get a bit more game time and be in a position to compete for Idrissa's position in January.

If he was bitching and moaning about him playing too much for Ireland, how was he able to play for us last weekend?

I too share your frustration at McCarthy playing for Ireland. Nothing against Ireland (I prefer them to England), I just feel we lose so many players to injuries they picked up, or have aggravated on international duty.

It seems to me, that more and more English people (particularly, in my experience, Scousers) have lost whatever love they may have felt for their own national team. Many of us never felt any to begin with. Fans and players of other nations seem to be passionately patriotic in comparison, I guess Macca falls into that category.

He wanted to play for his country. We don't have to like it, but we do have to accept and respect it.

Much as I enjoy seeing Irish/Welsh/Scottish passion, I've hated our players going out on international "duty" since 1986.

Big Nevs injury possibly... probably, cost us the double

Easy for managers to use the 'injury' excuse when players are either out of favour or no longer want to play for a manager.

Right now, after the West Ham game, I will be happy if any of them make Garth's 'Team of the Week'.

I do think, in may amateur opinion admittedly, that O'Neill should have protected him by leaving him out of the Moldova game but it seems odd that Koeman would have then risked him in the next game.

If that's the case, then it could require surgery and rule him out for months; which won't leave much time to impress Koeman before the undoubted shake up in the summer.

Shame; I'm in the pro McCarthy camp and believe he can get back to the player he was during his first season at the club.

Brian, on the face of it we all agree:- Mimms cost us the double; however, Southall was injured with ten League games to go. Of those ten games, we won six, drew two and lost two. Mimms kept six clean sheets and the two draws were both 0-0. You could argue that if we'd scored more goals we'd have cruised the League, after all, we lost it by two points. Losing to Oxford... that was the real bummer, as well as losing at Luton.

So, it's a bit disingenuous to slag Mimms off as being the reason we didn't collect our third Championship in three years when a lack of goals against Nottm Forest, Man Utd, Luton and Oxford is the real reason.

cue Martin O'Neill slamming a water bottle down wearing his skin tight tracky bottoms and his adidas world cups (his reminder that he was a player once)... he would then look downwards angrily and talk about how he played 5 times in 3 days under Brian Clough on no more than a half time orange and deep-heat.

Roy Keane - will be staring through him like he is looking at something 5000 yards away lowering his voice menacingly "you are an example of what is wrong with football today James you need to ask yourself whether you want to be a footballer.. playing for the Republic of Ireland is an honour (forgetting that he walked out on them in Japan)"

So James played and is now injured smashing.

I don't know how the hell Roy Keane was allowed back into the Irish camp? He totally deserted them over the training ground being like a car park and it was too hard. There was problems with the kit arrival. What a load of bollocks, as if he never played on a hard street and in a bib!

He was walking on water for Man Utd at the time and was farting well higher than his arse. The sorry part is Ireland lost a one-goal lead against Spain in the quarter-finals, which they well might have preserved had Mr Hyde been on the park. They were beaten on pens.

That was the most wide open World Cup I have ever seen as the remaining teams were all playing shite. They will never have a better chance... Not in my lifetime!

Draw a line under them, get them sold and move on. Any team can have these type of players, I know, but we seem to have too many of them. Simple as that.

The whole issue was Keane and his ego

He was being managed by SAF and who was Mick McCarthy to tell him what to do? He didn't like him and that was it.

As you pointed out, it wouldn't have been the first time he played on poor pitches but he was so used to flying first class with fellow world class players and now all of a sudden he didn't fancy tarnishing his "rep" playing with a load of hard working Joe Averages on the big stage.

He felt he was above the whole ROI set up. His phony tears when getting through against Italy didn't kid me – he doesn't love his country – he loves only himself.

I remember Raul clashed with Clemente, and he told the manager what he thought of him, and where to go, with plenty of expletives. Did Spain send their best player home?. NO. The FAI should never have let it get that far.

Paul (#36) and Peter (#39), Keane has his problems no doubt, but he sat down with McCarthy before the tournament in 2002 with a view to emphasising how well Ireland could do if they prepared properly.

They arrive in Saipan to prepare and it's a joke of a set-up. The gear hasn't arrived. This is what it was like playing for Ireland and it was the last straw for Keane. He didn't leave. He gave an interview from Saipan saying what happened and that that tournament would be his last. McCarthy hauled him into a team meeting and questioned him in front of the whole team, and suggested that he feigned injury in the playoff against Iran, despite an agreement that he would only play one leg.

Sure he could have put up with it and on and on we go. But he snapped and was happy the whole thing was done with for him.

Personally I'm not bothered – it says a lot when his fellow teammates like Holland and McAteer thought his complaints were very petty. Holland said Keane was moaning straight from the start of the trip.

No, I don't think him moaning says a lot. It says that he's a moaner. Guilty as charged.

Nowhere in his book did he say that. As for agreeing with the Muppet McAteer, enough said. The saddest part was Quinn, and Staunton, his fellow players sitting with McCarthy at the press conference.

he was representing his Country. I mean it wasn't like someone tried to chat up his Mrs... Or worse! Although the guy was a great player, he wasn't exactly an ambassador for Ireland like Brady! ... That Haaland grudge tackle after 4 years of simmering just shows what kind of a character he is.

Personally I think ROI fans looked to agree with Keane because of his status as the only world class player they had.

Paul @ 28, Tim Cahill was nominated a few years ago.

And as for the Southall/Mimms argument, it did have an effect on our season, but so did Linekers missing boots

Mimms was a fine understudy... but who amongst us thinks Rush would have scored that equalizing goal had Big Nev been in goal? When Rush got a toe to the ball, he was taking it past an good goalkeeper. He was not taking it around the finest one-on-one keeper ever.

Good goalkeepers come out and narrow the angle. but when Big Nev came out he would eclipse the goal. He would come out like a charging rhino perfect positioning, lightening speed, immense power.

No one blames Mimms... no crime in not being Neville Southall.

I am not saying that McCarthy drinks alcohol... but I am saying that any footballer who likes more than his fare share, can become very prone to injury, as alcohol does affect the joints and hinders the healing process of any muscle/joint/cartilage injury...

Next post from East Timur!!

The worst ten days I have ever had watching the blues, and I will go to my grave, after at least a thousand arguements, believing we were the better team.

In some ways, Oxford, was worse than Wembley, where I don't think I've ever witnessed a more nervous crowd, and after enjoying the first half of the Cup Final, I began to get the horrors at half-time when thinking about how fucking lucky that those bastards actually are.

My biggest wish before I do go to that grave? We get to inflict a bit of pain ourselves, in a really big game, and see how bitter those phoney bastards really are when they don't get their own way against us!

Tony, don't go yet, we haven't got you insured!!!

You're suggesting it though. The fact the suggestion was made in a sort of 'I put it to you...', Inspector Clouseau style of chucking a case together, doesn't change that.

"Gibson is injury prone and obviously likes a couple of scoops, as shown by him re-enacting Death Race 2000 down the 24hr. McCarthy has been injured a lot the last couple of years as well, hasn't he? Think about it. Eh? Eh? BING! There you go. Now you're catching on".

Fritzl fucking loved a Frappuccino. I was forced to drink one last week. Should I be waiting on tenterhooks for the police to start twatting my door down, demanding to take a tour of my basement?

Paul (#47), he had a short fuse, he'd had enough and didn't walk out. He decided to retire after the finals.

Maybe "slagged off" was a lazy response, although "slagged off" is certainly an accurate description of the criticism levelled at Mimms on some threads in the past.

Like everyone who witnessed Nev in his pomp, I regard him as the finest keeper I've ever seen, and that includes Schmeichel. Although there will no doubt be far more footage of HIM than there ever was of Nev, he was, and remains peerless...

I just think that memories tend to gain a rosey tint over time. I mean, we conceded more goals in the last 10 games Nev played that season than we did in Mimms's 10-game stint. The difference is, as Tony (#55) and myself earlier point out, it was the forwards' lack of goals in the run-in that duly cost us the League and not "Big Nev's injury possibly... probably, cost us the double".

The FA Cup Final, well, give me Nev on a one-to-one any day. His presence in THAT game would have made all the difference.

Gana and Barry need resting now and again but, with Barkley showing indifferent form, I would have considered Tom Davies for a place or moving Seamus up, with Holgate coming in at right back.

With the lack of wins in recent weeks, every game is becoming a cup final and one hopes that Koeman gets it right for the next game against the Hammers.

Three for the January sales...

January 'sales'? Who would buy Gibson with his injury record? We probably wouldn't get much for Besic either.

The problem is that we obviously wanted to get shut in order to get Sissoko in; otherwise, why would Moshiri come out with that drivel on TDD???

Playing two games for the ROI is his choice though it hasn't done him any favors with Koeman. Roll on January when the DoF can unearth more hidden gems like Bolasie.

We saw in the summer how hard it is to sign new players and come to a club like Everton who are not in Europe, haven't won a trophy for 21 years, and are miles away from London. It's so easy to say "get rid of so-and-so" but not so easy to replace them with better players. Look what we paid for Bolasie and what we were offering for Sissoko.

You could call it the return of the Prodigal Son...