The strange case of Rory Delap. When he runs out for Stoke City in the FA Cup final at Wembley next Saturday, Delap will be making his 566th first team appearance in English football. That's quite a statistic and an impressive career for any 34-year-old. How many of those named ahead of him in Giovanni Trapattoni's enlarged squad for the forthcoming Macedonia qualifier can match that? The answer to the question doesn't matter because Delap lost what was always a tenuous footing in the Irish set-up seven years and three managers ago. No amount of heroics for Stoke against Manchester City will change that.
Whether or not Delap could do a job in the current Irish squad is not even worth considering then. Sure, he's a Premier League regular with over 400 games in the top flight to his name (and that's with a season lost to a broken leg too!), unlike so many who are in there ahead of him, but that counts for naught when it comes to this guy. All the usual barometers used to gauge somebody's eligibility for international games (form, first-team appearances, etc.) are thrown out the window. Delap is considered unworthy of a place by the manager and, more importantly, by the Irish media. Nobody has ever campaigned on his behalf the way they have for fallen guitar hero Andy Reid (whatever happened to that guy?).
Very often in a team sport, a manager can take a shine to an individual player and constantly start the guy in his side. Then, a new boss comes in and drops the same player off the squad completely. Different strokes for different folks. The fascinating thing about Delap is so many different Irish managers haven't fancied him. He is unique in that while he's carved out a successful journeyman's club career (more successful and enduring than a lot of his Irish peers), he could never impact properly at international level. Mick McCarthy gave him the longest look but Brian Kerr, Steve Staunton (notoriously brilliant judge of talent) and Trapattoni have all deemed him not good enough.
For the son of a father from Donegal and a mother from Meath, it must be galling that 12 years have elapsed since he made a brace of competitive cameos for Ireland against Turkey in the Euro 2000 play-offs. His only minutes in meaningful games in an Irish shirt. He isn't even an afterthought when it comes to Irish squads these days yet he has made at least 34 Premiership starts in the past three seasons. How many Irish internationals players can we say the same about? Robbie Keane? No. Damien Duff? No. Shay Given? No. Glenn Whelan? Not quite. Didn't playing in the top flight used to count for something? Shouldn't it still?
But he's a long-throw merchant, the critics say. A one-trick pony. That's the only reason he's in the Stoke first team at Wembley. Take that away and he's just a very average player. Really? Anybody who believes somebody gets paid five figures each week to take throw-ins and gets to start almost every game in the Premier League doesn't understand the nature of professional sport. They also don't appreciate how hard Delap has worked and what an extraordinary career he's hewn for himself over the course of the past decade and a half. Just because he never made the cut with Ireland shouldn't blind us to his achievement.
What may be most impressive is that he is one of those increasingly rare species who started at the very bottom of the ladder. Growing up in Cumbria in the north-east of England, he began his professional life as a starter with Carlisle United, his local club, in Division Three at just 18. Those who figure he's just a set-piece machine need to understand you have to some talent to become a feature of the first team even down that low as a callow teenager.
"We were cleaning the terraces, forking the pitch, cleaning up after the games," Delap said of the time he entered the pro ranks. "It was crappy work at the time but it built great team spirit and we always had a laugh. We were also thrown into the first team at 18 because there wasn't the money to buy players so we had to play. Now clubs buy players."
In the week that's in it, it's somehow fitting that his finest hour with Carlisle came when they won the Auto Windscreens Trophy final at the old Wembley, a competition every bit as unglamorous as its sponsor's name suggests. From there he moved on to Derby County and to grasp the nature of his versatility and his longevity, Delap more than once played sweeper there alongside a half-decent centre-half by the name of Paul McGrath. Indeed, back then, he also did emergency service upfront for Jim Smith's team. Yes, the long-throw merchant played centre-forward in the Premier League at the age of 20. Very one-dimensional.
There followed a spell at Southampton and a forgettable stint at Sunderland where he was one of the fans' least favorite players. Well, to be fair, he never had the style to make him one of the darlings of the cognoscenti, and a recurring theme of his career has been the fact managers (that should be club managers) have always rated him higher than supporters. Except maybe at Stoke, where he is beloved by both Tony Pulis and the tens of thousands who will be roaring his name every time he trots out to take a throw-in on Saturday. News of his latest contract extension, a deal ensuring he will make his 600th appearance as a pro early next year for the club, was greeted with delight by the faithful.
There are several reasons why all right-thinking football folk should want Stoke to overturn Manchester City and their horrible Arabian money persona next Saturday afternoon. Delap and his noble, yet barely-noticed career, offers just one more. Come on, Stoke!
