It was a snap-shot of football at the highest level. Seventy thousand fans are in attendance, the floodlights are on and Italy are strutting their stuff. Eight minutes in, and a free-kick from the right‑hand side is squared back and across, with perfect disguise, for a player lurking on the edge of the penalty area. In a celebration of technique, he strikes the slightly bouncing ball first time with the inside of his right foot and sends it curling beyond the goalkeeper and into the far top corner of the net. Hysteria takes over.
The plaudits, however, are not for Italian vision or artistry, rather for a pair of Stoke City players in Irish green. The assist was some way for Liam Lawrence to begin an encouraging competitive debut for the Republic while Glenn Whelan may never score a more thrilling goal. It was the night when the Potteries threatened the downfall of the world champions, which is not a sentence that can have been written too regularly. The World Cup qualifying tie at Croke Park would end in a 2-2 draw, which saw Italy advance to South Africa as group winners and Ireland book a play-off spot but, within the array of sub-plots, the Stoke story stood out.
"I really think that Stoke players don't get the credit they deserve because we've got a certain style, people think that it's all long balls, throw-ins and all the rest of it," said the right-midfielder Lawrence, who emerged with credit from his duel against Fabio Grosso, the marauding Italy left-back; Grosso was substituted in the 76th minute. "We can obviously play some football and we proved that against Italy."
After a 12th-place finish on their Premier League debut last season, Stoke have started the season solidly and once again sit in mid-table. Tony Pulis, the manager, has described his club as being "Battersea Dogs Home, not Crufts, we are looking for the strays with the aim of bringing them back", and it is remarkable how many players have prospered at the Britannia Stadium.
Examples of those who were struggling to make the grade at English football's highest level only to revive at Stoke include the goalkeeper Thomas Sorensen, the defender Abdoulaye Faye, the midfielder Rory Delap and the strikers James Beattie and Ricardo Fuller. Then there is Whelan, another midfielder, signed from Sheffield Wednesday, and Lawrence. Ireland can enjoy some of the benefits.
"I left Sunderland under a bit of a cloud," said Lawrence, who began his professional career in League Two at Mansfield Town; he joined them after being released from the Nottingham Forest youth set-up at the age of 14. "I went to Sunderland from Mansfield but sometimes players need a wake-up call when they get released from bigger clubs. I went to Stoke, it was a big time in my career to get my head down and work hard, and I've done that and not looked back. I've had to work my way right up from the bottom of the league and thankfully now I'm where I want to be. At Stoke, everybody is improving all of the time and if that continues, it can only be good for club and country."
The cloud under which Lawrence left Sunderland was his being caught on film in a group sex romp. Already on loan at Stoke, he was quickly granted a permanent transfer in January 2007 by the then Sunderland manager Roy Keane. But Lawrence, who hopes to win his fourth international cap in the final group tie against Montenegro at Croke Park on Wednesday, is now more settled on and off the pitch and he can look forward with optimism.
"I think that with us taking Italy so close, a few teams will look at that and not want to face us in the play-offs," the 27-year-old added. "When we're on our game, it doesn't matter who we get."
