SOCCER: His frank post-match assessments of performances, individual and collective, has sometimes left Don Givens looking like a fierce critic of some of his own international players, but yesterday the former Ireland striker described the current crop of Irish under-21s as the strongest he has worked with since taking on his current role in the national game's set-up.

Givens said that he had been particularly impressed by the attitude and application of several members of his current team which goes into tomorrow night's European under-21 Championship qualifying game against Cyprus looking to extend an already unprecedented 12-match unbeaten run.

"It's always hard to say who will go on to become regulars in the senior squad when you're looking at players at this stage but I would imagine that at least four of this group will," said Givens. "Aidan McGeady, Stephen Kelly and Stephen Elliott have huge chances. So does Seán Thornton - but Seán needs to maintain a disciplined attitude. Certainly he has the ability.

"But so do several others," he continued. "Paddy McCarthy and Glenn Whelan - for example - have developed from under-19 level to the point where I would say that they are decent players with a fair chance of getting capped. And there are other young lads - Paul Keegan and Darren Potter - who have the potential to be really good players."

Not for the first time, however, Givens lamented the attitude towards the game of some of the youngsters, expressing bewilderment, in particular, at their lukewarm interest in looking at and learning from some of Europe's great players.

"Young players now just don't tend to love the game as much as they should do. I get the impression that they would prefer to watch Eastenders than Real Madrid against Barcelona.

"This group has a big work ethic but to make it they have to be like John O'Shea. They have to do the extra training. They have to show extra desire.

"But they do still appear to be that bit more determined than some of the earlier groups. They have grown up with a winning mentality. They have come up together through the age groups and got used to qualifying for tournaments and in the World Cup last year they did well. They got to the last 16 - and only three other European teams managed that.

The upshot, he says, is that "the pedigree is there and when they come up against the Italys, the Spains and the Germanys - they tend to be successful."