Trai Hume hopes play-off final experience will help in crunch Italy showdown
Northern Ireland’s World Cup qualifying play-off semi-final against Italy on Thursday night will be the biggest game in the lives of pretty much every player in Michael O’Neill’s side, but Trai Hume has at least been somewhere close before.
While Paddy McNair and Josh Magennis are the only players in the current squad who went to Euro 2016, Hume experienced the pressure of such a one-off game last season when he helped Sunderland to a 2-1 win over Sheffield United in the Championship play-off final.
That completed the former Linfield and Ballymena defender’s rise from League One to the Premier League with the Black Cats, and the 24-year-old will draw on the experience in Bergamo.
“It was definitely different,” Hume said. “The emotion going into the game and the pressure and what it meant. Playing in that game and getting promoted to the Premier League is life-changing, for your career, financially for your family, it changes everything.
“I think going through that experience, it was nervous and exciting, but I think you learn from that and you gain that experience and all the games after that come that little bit easier.”
Different players approach big occasions in different ways. Hume – who will have the captain’s armband for the eighth time on Thursday night – said he takes each one differently.
“It depends on the squad and the team you’ve got around you,” he said. “But I think the personality I have now and the little bit of experience I’ve gained I probably have to be that leader and manage other players within the group.
“We are a young team but we have a lot of experience at international level, we’ve played a lot of games but I think you can always keep everyone calm and keep everyone ready.”
O’Neill has nurtured a young group during his second spell as Northern Ireland manager, and given that 15 of the 28-strong squad are 25 or under and eight of them 21 or under, he can argue with some justification they are ahead of schedule simply to be in this position.
In contrast to an Italy side under intense pressure to avoid what would be an unthinkable third consecutive failure to qualify for a World Cup finals, O’Neill’s side should be able to play with more freedom in Italy.
“I think you have to realise that we’ve done incredibly well to be in this position,” O’Neill said.
“There’s a lot of bigger nations than us that are not at this point in the competition. I’m incredibly proud of the players for being in this situation after a qualification group where we faced difficulties with players who were not available to us.
“I don’t think I need to instil any belief in them. I think they know what’s at stake. I think being the smaller nation, with the expectation on the home nation, we come into the game a little bit looser, with a little bit more freedom in ourselves.
“We just want to make sure we give a performance where we do ourselves justice in the game, and obviously try to take the next step in the competition.”