Is O'Neill's next Northern Ireland team already here?

Michael O'Neill's latest Northern Ireland side is built around players in their early 20s

"Will they have careers like Steven Davis has had? Like Jonny Evans has had? Or Aaron Hughes has had? Who knows?"

On the same day that Northern Ireland's senior side could find no way past Belarus goalkeeper Fedor Lapoukhov over the course 90 frustrating minutes in western Hungary on Saturday, the country's under-21s had no such problems in a 5-0 win over Azerbaijan.

Tommy Wright's underage panel have found a fine patch of form of late, beating Serbia away in March and drawing with England in September before last weekend's comprehensive win.

What makes their recent results all the more impressive is how many eligible players are already senior, and seasoned, internationals.

Michael O'Neill started five players aged 21 or younger against Belarus - according to Opta, a first for Northern Ireland in 13 years. It was no aberration either.

While 19-year-old goalkeeper Pierce Charles was making his debut after injuries to the more experienced Bailey Peacock-Farrell and Conor Hazard, his brother Shea (20), Conor Bradley (21), Isaac Price (21) and Trai Hume (22) have formed the spine of the side through a Nations League campaign that continues against Bulgaria at Windsor Park on Tuesday night.

"They listen to start with. For how long, we'll see," joked O'Neill when asked what were the biggest plusses of working with such a young group.

"Every manager likes bringing younger players into the group. I think they invigorate any group of players."

This youth movement, however, has not necessarily been wholly by design. When O'Neill returned to the post at the end of 2022, he envisaged relying upon a core of the side who had helped him enjoy such a fruitful spell first time around.

Unforeseen, however, was that the side he inherited would be so drastically different to the one he has just two years later. In essence, this already feels not like O'Neill's second Northern Ireland team, but his third.

Between September 2023 and August 2024, Craig Cathcart, Steven Davis, Stuart Dallas and Jonny Evans all retired, the latter stepping away from international football while still continuing for Manchester United.

That quartet alone accounted for 382 international caps as well as the vast majority of the squad's Premier League experience.

"This team hasn't been developed over two years," O'Neill said.

"If you go back to January 2023, I was in a situation coming into a game in March where I hoped Davis would be available, I hoped Dallas would be available, Corry Evans, Jonny, Cathcart, Shane Ferguson.

"Normally when you bring a young player into the team, he's aided and supported by more experienced players. We're not in a position to be able to do that.

"We're putting a lot of young players in at the one time and to be honest I think they're doing well."

Pierce Charles (19) became Northern Ireland's youngest goalkeeper since 1964 against Belarus on Saturday

In his first spell as manager, O'Neill worked with five of Northern Ireland's seven most capped players of all time.

When asked the key to ensuring a promising international career turns into a long one, he returned to one of his recurring themes - at what level and how regularly his squad are playing their club football.

"As I've said many times, it's not like they've 100 league games under their belts or anything like that. They've had to learn without the benefit of going back and playing for their clubs at times as well.

"The influence we can have on it is giving them exposure at international level which hopefully helps the club situation when they go back, the way the manager looks at them or maybe brings them to the attention of other clubs as well."

With O'Neill looking to become just the second manager to lead Northern Ireland to a second major tournament, he sees a "developing side", one already "very good without the ball" and showing a desire "to improve together" before qualification campaigns for the 2026 World Cup and Euro 2028.

With Liverpool's Bradley thrillingly leading the way, there have been times over the past year when it appears the future is already here. At others, most especially when averaging just a goal a game across their past seven games, the side have looked at the correct level in the third tier of the Nations League.

While the manager describes himself as "optimistic" for the future, naturally it cannot be predicted exactly how the international careers of these talented individuals will progress, or if a much needed goalscorer will emerge to play alongside them.

"I think there's a lot of players that will be in this group for a long period of time.

"Where their careers go, will they have careers like Steven Davis has had? Like Jonny Evans has had? Or Aaron Hughes has had? Who knows?

"Certainly they've got the potential to have long and established international careers and hopefully successful ones as well."