source: football.co.uk

Though I'm still not convinced that Robbie Keane is the right man to captain ireland, the armband had a very positive effect on the striker during the game against Sweden. As Niall Quinn noted in his surprisingly good newspaper column Keane has played with slumped shoulders recently, but against Sweden his chest was out and his performance was fantastic.

It remains to be seen if Keane can maintain that level in a difficult away Euro 2008 qualifier (the trip to Slovakia for example), but if he does I will gladly eat my words.