"He said he went to school in his bare feet, too, but it didn't matter because his school was only 100 yards away. I said: 'Dad, that's not really the point.' "McCarthy tells me this story by way of explaining why his father emigrated to Barnsley half a century ago, though even after making the grade as a professional footballer – for Barnsley – McCarthy junior gave no consideration to which country he might play for."I was fairly confident, but I'd have to have been arrogant beyond belief to think that I might end up playing international football when I was turning out against Halifax at The Shay on a wet Tuesday evening," he says. "Then Allan Clarke came to the club and asked me who I qualified to play for."When I said England or Ireland, he told Johnny Giles, who was Ireland manager at the time. Nothing came of it, which doesn't surprise me because Gilesy didn't rate me even when I did play for Ireland."McCarthy finally won the first of his 57 caps under Eoin Hand and in due course became a stalwart of the team that performed so heroically in the 1988 European Championship, which is where he first encountered the Dutch – the Dutch team of Ruud Gullit and Marco van Basten."We played very well," he recalls. "We lost 1-0 to a Wim Kieft deflected goal after 78 minutes." A chuckle "Not that I remember it well We were excellent at stopping other teams playing, the best. We played the ball into channels, up to the big fellas, then got up behind them, squeezed and pressed, and there was an honesty and a work ethic about the team that's still there.

We were one of the first to show that teams like that, with good players but not household names, could compete at the very top."Since then Norway have done similar. If you have a system, and people that fit into that system, and work very hard at it, then you're in with a chance in any walk of life."Such is the philosophy that McCarthy will take into Saturday's game, with players such as Richard Dunne barely famous even in their own households. The Manchester City defender has stepped down a division since he made a fine international debut, against the Netherlands, but McCarthy will keep faith with him. "I tend to look at what they've done for me, not for their clubs, and Richard Dunne has done fantastically That rubbed off from Big Jack. Towards the end of my career I was in Millwall reserves for 12 months, maybe longer, but he never dropped me."Dunne played for City on Monday, a fixture McCarthy could have done without, just as Sven Goran Eriksson could have done without the Bolton v Liverpool game. "Richard Dunne might not have the same ring to his name as Michael Owen," says McCarthy, "but to me he does."He thinks the Liverpool game should have been postponed "Television has been wonderful for the game.

But the TV people would have been the first berating Eriksson if England had lost five players on Monday and then lost to Germany."McCarthy's name was one of those tossed into the ring during the search for an England coach to succeed Kevin Keegan, but he scoffs at the notion. "I do look at their squad sometimes, when I've got Quinny injured, and look at Owen, Fowler, Heskey, Cole.. but then maybe that choice just gives him more headaches No, I don't fancy that job And, by the way, I think he's done wonderfully so far. He's brought calm to the team because he's not emotionally involved."I ask McCarthy whether he would like, one day, to return to club management "Yeah, definitely. Because no job in football is forever, and I miss the daily involvement with the players. I miss Saturday afternoons, and the elation, even the frustration and devastation, of club management."After Barnsley, McCarthy played for Manchester City, Celtic, Lyon and Millwall. But Barnsley's is still the first result he looks for on a Saturday.