Good goods come in small parcels as Andew Moran can prove against Grenada on Saturday
Preston schemer can make hay in the Spanish sunshine like Messi and Wes
There’s a Sportsfile photograph or two online right now of Andrew Moran basking in the sunshine at the La Finca resort in Spain, the venue for Ireland’s current training camp ahead of Saturday’s friendly against Grenada in Murcia.
Preston midfielder Moran looks totally at ease in the Stephen McCarthy photos, be they on the training pitch, with the ball at his feet or sitting in front of the media when he sat down with the travelling journalists on Thursday.
It’s not surprising. Andrew - or Andy as he is also known - is a young man who doesn’t get phased by the challenge in front of him. He tackles anything presented to him by life as an international footballer in waiting with a calmness and a confidence way beyond his 22 years on this planet.
It’s not a surprise to those who have followed Moran’s process since his days as a real prospect in waiting at Knocklyon United, Bray St Joseph’s Boys or Bray Wanderers. And those who know him well from back then know just how much adversity Moran had to overcome to get his day in the Spanish sunshine.
Size has always been an issue around Andrew or Andy Moran. Not with him but with those who judged him as a young player. He was too skinny, not tall enough, not physical enough to play in the centre of midfield, the area his sublime touch and eye for a pass would suggest he belongs in.
That sizeism haunted the player in his early days. Those who worked him in St Joseph’s Boys almost had to beg clubs to take a look at the youngster before he finally got a move to Bray and became their youngest ever player when he played at just 15 years and 307 days against Drogheda United in August 2019.
The teenage Moran did enough and soon enough with Bray to move to Brighton in July 2020 where one time FAI employee John Morling took him under his wing alongside the likes of Evan Ferguson and Leigh Kavanagh.
Such a move may seem like a dream come true for a 16-year-old kid but it hasn’t been easy in England for the former Ireland under 21 captain either, not even since Brighton ignored his size and took a chance on him in 2020.
With just one first team game to his name at the Albion, Moran has had to grow up and fill out whilst on loan at Blackburn, Preston and the Los Angeles FC before finally leaving Brighton for Preston on a permanent deal in the January transfer window.
Even there, he’s had to bide his time, finally getting into the first team on a regular basis at the tail end of the Championship season as promotion slipped from their view at Deepdale.
Now though, there is real hope at North End that Moran will become their playmaker supreme next season and that, in itself, can only help his international career.
Andrew Moran wasn’t in the conversation around the Ireland squad for the World Cup play-off against Czechia in March despite that move back to England and he will be the first to know why - a lack of regular first team football at club level was always going to consign him to the ranks of the also rans.
Many of those players missing from the Prague conversation are in Murcia this weekend for the Grenada game but few of them have as much to gain from this B Specials international as Moran.
Forget about his size. Moran, with the right players around him, has that rare quality that any international team needs to compete at the top level - he can pick a pass and he can pick holes in any defence. We don’t have that type of player operating at senior level right now and probably won’t have until Viktor Ozhianvuna lives up to his potential when he moves to Arsenal next year.
The fact is, we haven’t had a player like Andrew Moran since Wes Hoolohan last played for Ireland. And he was another player who had to battle against sizeism all his career.
Wes came good in the end. So too will Andrew Moran and I hope he proves as much against Grenada on Saturday and plays so well then that he is in the team again next month and plays as a creative 10 against Qatar and Canada before the summer break.
What’s interesting here, going back to his media duties on Thursday, is the way some of the visiting media linked Andrew Moran with Lionel Messi, the Argentinean genius and World Cup winner.
Moran was injured when Los Angeles FC played Inter Miami in the MLS but Argentina did use the same La Finca training ground when they were in Spain last November.
So Moran and Messi have been on the same grass. And they also have that perceived lack of height issue.
Thankfully, it has never stopped Messi delivering for club or country. It never stopped Hoolahan. And it won’t stop Andrew Moran either. Saturday’s game against Grenada is his best chance yet to prove it. for two please.