Stephen Carr's career could have one last twist, says Blues team-mate
Nov 28 2009 by Andy Walker, Birmingham Mail
STEPHEN Carr’s return to professional football gets all the more remarkable as each game passes.
Next Tuesday, it will be exactly a year to the day since Carr initially announced his retirement from the game.
But now he finds himself back in the Premier League as a vital cog in an in-form Blues team.
However, his injured understudy at right-back, Stuart Parnaby, believes that Carr’s comeback is capable of going one step further – by taking him out of retirement from international football.
Carr has already twice retired from the Republic of Ireland picture. He quit the international scene when his nation failed to qualify for the 2006 World Cup before being coaxed back by Steve Staunton. However, due to injuries and the sacking of Staunton, he again called an end to his days with the Irish team in November 2007.
Surely Carr wouldn’t consider another sensational return? Parnaby believes that the 33-year-old would easily be good enough for Giovanni Trapattoni’s crestfallen troops.
“It’s ridiculous when you think about it,” said Parnaby on Carr’s continued form.
“Some people are saying that perhaps he should be getting himself back in the Ireland team because if he wanted to then he probably could. He’s been that good.”
Even Blues boss Alex McLeish must still pinch himself when he thinks back to the phone-call he received from a mutual friend telling him that Carr would fancy a trial at Blues.
As bargains go, Carr’s acquisition has been tantamount to daylight robbery.
“There’s no doubt he’s been a really tremendous acquisition,” acknowledges McLeish, “after plucking him from nowhere I suppose, when he had announced his retirement.
“He reads the game well and that’s his experience.
“He’s a quality defender and he very rarely loses in the air at the back post. He’s great at getting his body into the forwards and he’s got a good spring himself, but his engine – he’s got a fantastic capacity to go up and down the pitch.”
From the moment he stepped in at right-back on that chilly Tuesday night at Crystal Palace back in February, Carr hasn’t looked back.
Ireland boss Trapattoni can sometimes be stubborn – take his views on Keith Fahey for example, and how he already had players who fitted “the system”. Cruel as it may have been, missing out on next year’s World Cup may change the Italian’s view on future call-ups.
And the veteran manager wouldn’t be ridiculed if he came looking to persuade Carr to dust off his old international boots for one last time.
