Unboxing Damien Duff’s Shelbourne

Damien Duff captained Ireland on his 100^th and final international appearance just days after Shelbourne tumbled to a 3-2 defeat to Shamrock Rovers in June 2012.

That fixture saw current Shels goalkeeping coach Paul Skinner on the bench for the Reds while the Dundalk boss Stephen O’Donnell was on the Rovers bench.

And the same month’s edition of Society for Consumer Psychology published a paper from Norton, Mochon and Ariely entitled, “The IKEA effect: when labour leads to love”.

November 2021 saw Ian Morris's successor as Shelbourne manager named and in his unveiling statement, Damien Duff channelled the same creative juices as those embarking upon an IKEA assembly project

“I’m extremely passionate about youth development in Ireland and about Irish football in general and see this as a great opportunity to help build something that both the club, its fans and myself can be proud of,” Duff said at the time.

“With the club in the Premier Division and the foundations being put in place by the board and its directors, I can’t wait to start.”

Fast forward to October 2023 and Duff’s Shelbourne side – based just a few miles down the road from IKEA’s flagship Irish store – are sitting fifth in the top-flight table.

The Reds two points behind Bohemians and three behind St Patrick’s Athletic – although the Saints have a game in hand on the Tolka Park side.

Defence v Attack

Shels have netted 37 goals in the league this season – which is ten less than Bohs and 19 less than the Saints.

Only Sligo Rovers (34 goals), Cork City (33 goals) and relegated UCD (15 goals) have scored fewer.

But the Reds boast the meanest defence in the entire division, with 23 goals conceded in 33 games. Goalkeeper Conor Kearns has 13 clean sheets to his name.

Four 1-0 victories, nine goalless draws and only six defeats (the second lowest in the league behind the four of Shamrock Rovers) is a lesson in functional football.

Of those six defeats, five were 1-0 losses and three of these came against St Pat’s.

Of the other three league losses, one each went to title chasers Derry City and Shamrock Rovers and the other was a 2-1 loss at the start of the season away to Dundalk.

Duff's troops clearly pay attention to the half time team talks as, from the six league games they entered the dressing room at half time losing, they took an average of 1.83 points.

That is the highest in the league and is more than twice the next best record.

On the three occasions they consumed the half time oranges while leading at Tolka Park, they took all three points on each occasion.

Much like the Swedish flatpackers up the road, Shelbourne place form and function at the heart of what they do.

The Conor Kearns effect

Goalkeeper Kearns has not missed a moment in the Premier Division this season and, according to sofascore.com, has an 80% save success rate this season while completing 83% of his passes inside his own half.

The 25-year-old Templeogue native is approaching his 150^th league game and has conceded more than once for Shelbourne on only two occasions.

Of the 23 goals he has conceded, seven have been from outside the area – which is just one less than Lorcan Healy who has the highest in the league.

Kearns’ save percentage inside the box is 60/76 (78.94%) and outside the box is 27/34 (79%). 

In front of Kearns on the pitch Duff has again placed a value on practical solutions with Luke Byrne being a perennial fixture in the Reds defence prior to his recent injury.

Other central defensive options have been title winning defenders Paddy Barrett (Dundalk), Shane Griffin (Cork City), Kameron Ledwidge (22, 74 apps) the versatile Gavin Molloy (21, 54 apps) or Andrew Quinn (21, 71 apps).

In the full back slots, Molloy, Griffin and Ledwidge have provided cover while the Wilson brothers bring further experience to the flanks in the defence.

JR is just 24-years-old and has 115 senior appearances to his name, while 23-year-old Tyreke has 97.

Shelbourne's simplicity

A review of the 2022 season here https://youtu.be/vU_pPolpSXE indicated how seventh place Shelbourne exceeded the league average in one metric – passing percentage.

This form has continued in 2023 with Quinn, Molloy, Griffin, Byrne and Barrett all appearing in the top 15 passing percentages of all defenders in the league.

In addition, Byrne (4.4) and Barrett (3.7) are in the top seven players in terms of clearances per game.

Further up the field, battle hardened Mark Coyle brings an extra layer of protection.

Affectionately known as the Burt Kante by Finn Harps fans prior to his departure from Ballybofey, the 26-year-old made his 50th Shelbourne appearance on Friday and is approaching 150 career league appearances with two thirds of those in the Premier Division.

With a single goal to his name for the Reds this season, he does not pose a fearsome attacking threat but with an average of 5.5 interceptions per game and an average passing accuracy of 82% (90% in his own half), the job expected from the Donegal native is evident.

Ball recovery forms an important part of his role, dropping his average fouls per game from 2.3 in 2019 (fourth highest in the league according to Instat Summary Report) to 1.7 (giving a total of 41, leaving him ninth highest according to sofascore.com)

His midfield partner JJ Lunney’s passing accuracy of 85.42% is the third highest in the league (behind Gary O’Neill and Graham Burke) of those players who have made more than five league appearances.

And his 54 tackles is the seventh highest in the league with him and Coyle forming a solid platform from which to build an attacking threat.

Jack's the source of the attack

The creative fulcrum for Shelbourne is their playmaker Jack Moylan.

The former Bohs schemer has one of the lowest percentage pass completion in the league but, in contrast to the safe nature which is exhibited by his teammates back the field, Moylan has licence to attempt more challenging passes to unlock opposition defences.

With 10 league goals so far this season, all scored inside the box, the north Dubliner is Shelbourne's top scorer.

And despite being more recognisable as an attacking midfielder, he has led the line up front in the absence of Sean Boyd.

Boyd, 25, has not played since scoring against Cork City at the end of July, having only suffered defeat once in his 10 league outings in 2023.

He has scored four goals in the 553 minutes he has played – which averages out as a goal scored every 113 minutes.

That is the second most prolific goal tally per minute in the league this season and is ahead of his average of a goal every 180 minutes in 2022.

Boyd's most recent outing at Turner's Cross saw debuts for Harry Wood and Will Jarvis, with both recording important goals for the club.

Wood's late equaliser at Oriel Park in August and Jarvis' winner at Tolka Park on Friday saw the Reds take four points from the clashes against Dundalk alone – which is the current gap between the teams in terms of points.

Dundalk downed

Friday night's encounter between Shelbourne and Dundalk highlighted many positive aspects of Shelbourne’s play which has been evident throughout the season.

In defence, injury ruled out right back JR Wilson, centre half Quinn and the exciting right sided defender David Toure.

As a result, Wilson's brother Tyreke – a left back by trade – switched to the right hand side of defence and Griffin took the captain's armband to start at left back in a back four.

In 2022, Shelbourne played a back four for only 4% of their playing time with Griffin stationed regularly on the right hand side of the back three while Molloy, centre half alongside Barrett on Friday, spent much of last season in a defensive midfield role.

Shelbourne’s management team returned to their 2022 roots towards the end of their win over Dundalk as they sought to preserve their clean sheet on the night with the arrival of Kameron Ledwidge in the 84^th minute.

Following an injury to substitute Brian McManus (after a late challenge from John Martin who was lucky to only get a yellow card), ex-Southampton prospect Ledwidge dropped into left back with Griffin moving inside to form a back five.

Behind the defence, Kearns – who has faced a league high 76 shots this season – did not have a single shot to save while of the 11 shot attempts the Lilywhites did have, less than half were inside the box.

Of these five attempts, four were headers (two in injury time) and one was a shot from Pat Hoban blocked by a Shelbourne defender.

In contrast to Dundalk, Shelbourne did not have a single shot inside the Dundalk penalty area once Evan Caffrey's 36^th minute effort was saved by Nathan Shepperd. That was the only save either goalkeeper had to make in the game.

Once Shelbourne made the breakthrough with Will Jarvis's fourth minute effort, they had a platform to defend and they dropped off in the second half possession stakes from 51% in the opening period to 33% in the closing period.

The first 45 minutes also saw an interesting pattern with Shels completing all nine of their dribble attempts in contrast to Dundalk's one in two. During the second half, the home side only took on another four dribble attempts but completed them all.

Moylan finished up with four completed dribbles on the night – one of which resulted in the only goal of the game – while he had another couple of shots himself at the end of his runs.

A feature of the game was his willingness to run at the Dundalk defence and Darren Brownlie.

The Scotsman was lucky not to concede a penalty in the second half following a coming together between the two.

Four different Shelbourne players, Moylan (4/4), Jarvis (3/3), Wood (2/2) and Wilson (2/2) recorded 100% dribble success rates.

In contrast, despite having four recognised wingers on the pitch at stages during the game- Dan Kelly, Ryan O'Kane, Sam Durrant and Daryl Horgan – Dundalk only attempted six dribbles in total and competed two.

Of these two, one was from Durrant and one from Archie Davies – both of whom attempted two dribbles each.

Davies came into the game with an assist in each of his three previous games and currently has the second highest number of successful dribbles in the league (45) behind Moylan (54).

Davies, Connor Malley (34) and Ryan O’Kane (27) all find themselves in the top eight players for successful dribbles in the league.

For Shelbourne, Harry Wood (16) is the next highest Shelbourne player in 33^rd position.

Hull City duo make their mark

Since Wood (11 league appearances, 2 goals) and Jarvis (9 league appearances, 2 goals) have joined the club, Shelbourne have only lost once in the league – a narrow 1-0 defeat to Shamrock Rovers.

The attacking impetus they have brought has somewhat negated the loss of Boyd, Matty Smith (4 goals, one assist) and the promising Jad Hakiki (4 assists in 20 league games).

2022 saw Shelbourne finish in seventh place and reach the FAI Cup Final – reaching the objective set out by Duff at the start of his maiden campaign at Tolka Park.

But this season, they have reduced their concession rate from 1.36 goals per game to 0.7.

Clean sheets are up to 13 so far compared to ten last season and they have slightly increased their scoring rate from 1.11 goals per game to 1.12.

This has ultimately resulted in a points per game average of 1.6 which is a healthy increase on last season’s 1.14.

Thus back to the 2012 paper, and much like the many households around Ireland unboxing products from the Scandinavian flat pack giants and turning a set of objects into a long lasting structure fit for display, Duff’s Shelbourne side are now establishing themselves as a well put together outfit looking for a space at the top table of the European chasing clubs.

“Pushing for Europe is totally different to the pressure of a relegation battle, or just playing games behind one of the mid table teams, where we’re at now,” Duff said before a recent game against St Pat’s.

“It gives you added focus, gets juice flowing. Why it’s addictive and why the people on the pitch, the people in the stand, it’s why we’re hooked on football.” 

It is fair enough to say that is the language of love moving on from the labour of building foundations and wardrobes.