Stephen Kenny believes that he will be judged at the end of the Euro 2024 campaign and stated that whether his contract is renewed "will depend on how people feel the campaign went overall".
The Ireland manager has come under fire after just two games of the current qualifying campaign following his side's disappointing defeat to Greece on Friday night.
And while Kenny was quick to admit that his side has a mountain to climb following the Athens loss against a lower-ranked side, however, he believes that there is a lot of football to be played in the group and is putting all his focus on Monday night’s home tie against Gibraltar.
Kenny is confident that despite the slow start, he will remain in charge of the national side for the remainder of the Euro 2024 campaign, and added that he did not seek any assurances regarding his immediate future.
The manager, however, was in no humour to discuss his tenure up to this juncture on the eve of the Gibraltar qualifier.
And when pushed on his track record over the past three years, where his results were described as shambolic, Kenny felt that it was a disrespectful line of questioning at a press conference discussing the imminent home game against Gibraltar.
"I’m not going to sit here and do a full press conference on an assessment of my period in charge or anything like that, I’m here really to prepare for tomorrow, the game against Gibraltar, it’s a big game for us," said the manager.
"I’m disappointed that we lost against Greece but we got to bounce back against Gibraltar and I’m fairly sure we can do that and we’ll take that into September."
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Kenny did admit that the last 12 months’ results have been disappointing when asked whether he felt that he thought the team would be further along at this stage of his tenure.
"It is a fair question," said Kenny. "Disappointed about the Greek game. I'm disappointed we didn't get the result that we needed. Irish teams, even when they've got some good results away from home, haven't always outplayed teams. They've dug in.
"The disappointing thing is that even when we took a period of pressure that we didn't see it out and defend properly. That is disappointing as it would have altered the way the game would have played out. Conceding goals like we did particularly the second one after half time.
"Listen, we have lost a game that we wanted to win and we have to bounce back against Gibraltar."
However, despite the disappointment, Kenny did not believe that he got his tactics completely wrong in Athens and said that only one of the early substitutions was in relation to a change from the original gameplan.
"Tactically, we change regularly, not just us, a lot of teams change tactically in games," said Kenny.
"We work on two ways of playing, it’s not overly complicated. We work on 3-5-2 or 3-4-2-1 or 3. Certainly, all the players are very clear.
"Ferguson, Idah, that was their first time playing together. But they’re both excellent players and they’re both capable of playing together. It wasn’t their fault. We just didn’t link in with the front two the way we would have wanted.
"The one substitution at half time was what it was, a tactic modification.
"The two substitutions on 53 weren’t, they were an injection of fresh legs into the team when James (McClean) and Jason (Knight) came on. So they are different, I treat both selections differently."
Speaking after the match on Friday night, Kenny did accept that the team that played in Athens could be considered inexperienced, but the manager did not accept the suggestion that some of the players might be finding it difficult to meet the demands of international football.
"We’ve had a lot of good performances, certainly our previous performance against France was excellent, against the previous world champions.
"It was a narrow defeat and we were disappointed with that. I think we’ve come out the wrong side of some epic games 2-1 and we need to obviously change that against the better teams.
"We showed here, beating Scotland 3-0, what we are capable of, but we need more of that. There is no doubt about that.
"I think our performances at home and away against Scotland were top-drawer, our performance (away to) Ukraine was top-drawer, if you are going back that far.
"I don’t want to sit here and justify, because we have had defeats, it wasn’t good enough in Greece the other night and I’m disappointed.
"I know that was an important game in the group and I know we lost it, and I know there is criticism of me because of that. I accept that, I accept the criticism. I don’t think I’m above that. I know that. I get that.
"I absolutely get it, I feel it, that’s part of it, that’s the job I’m in and I understand that. But I do believe in the players, I very much do, and we are going into a game against Gibraltar and we want to get three points and take that into the September window."
Watch Republic of Ireland v Gibraltar in the Euro 2024 qualifier on Monday night from 7pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/Sport and the RTÉ News app or listen to live radio commentary with Game On on 2fm
Watch Republic of Ireland v Zambia on Thursday night from 7pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, or follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/Sport and the RTÉ News app
