Northern Ireland 1-0 Luxembourg: Is Jimmy Donnelly ready to fill the ‘problem position’?

Kane’s goalscoring feats only came after a number of frustrating loan spells away from Tottenham earlier in his career with Donnelly currently suffering similar struggles.

Having impressed for Leyton Orient last season, and making his international debut for Brisbane Road, he has found things tougher in the Championship with Stoke this year.

Since the start of September, he has played just 37 minutes for the club, which has in turn hampered his international opportunities.

Born in Northern Ireland but raised in England, Donnelly represented both at youth level and it was seen as a real coup when O’Neill persuaded him to feature in the green shirt at senior level in March. However, Monday marked his first match since the first international break with the team.

O’Neill believes Donnelly has been “unlucky” not to have won more than six caps, but believes you can always see his quality in the Premier League.

“He looks like the kind of player who was at a high level as a young player at a club like Tottenham all through his days,” he said.

“He’s obviously still a Spurs player at this moment. He’s put himself in a situation where his loan hasn’t gone as well as he’d hoped.

“It’s happened to a lot of players. A lot of players have been in that situation where the loan wasn’t always successful, but they’ve learned from that as well. He’s only 20, so he’s got everything ahead of him.”

It was Donnelly’s struggle for regular football this season that prompted his return to the Northern Ireland Under-21s last month.

However, according to the latest evidence, he is now in pole position to start what will be the country’s biggest match for at least five years, after the play-off in March.

O’Neill hopes the situation “resolves itself” in the coming months, while Donnelly believes his international progress could help his club’s chances – which in turn helps his chance of retaining the number nine shirt in Northern Ireland.

“I think I need to play for my club to have any chance of playing in March because Michael talks a lot about it,” he said.

“I guess [the Luxembourg showing] It would have helped if someone from Stoke was watching me and seeing that I had a bit of quality. I’ll come back and see what happens.

He added: “Things didn’t go the way I wanted, but hopefully I can start playing and scoring, and that puts me in a good position for the matches in March.”