Glenn Whelan wants the James McClean hype to slow down

Irish international Glenn Whelan has warned fans to temper their views of James McClean, stating that Irish fans currently have unrealistic expectations of the Sunderland winger.

McClean fans were delighted to the see the 23-year-old make the Ireland squad announcement earlier this week, though some - including no-frills midfielder Whelan - believe that the player's breakthrough season at Sunderland has pushed fans' expectation levels far too high.

Referring to Giovanni Trapattoni's post-game comment that the Aviva Stadium crowd's reception for McClean's international debut "as though they [the Irish crowd during the substitution] had greeted Messi or Pele!" during the March friendly against the Czech Republic, Whelan said that the player has plenty to prove at international level.

"What's he played, 10 or 15 minutes of international football and he is compared to Pele?" Whelan asked the Irish Sun. "That's a little bit much."

"For James, everything has gone right for him at the right time but he is only a young lad and has only just got into the Sunderland team so I don’t think anybody, especially us as players and people of the press, should be putting the pressure on him."

"[McClean] doesn’t need the pressure of being compared to this player and that player because if it doesn’t work for him then the shoe is on the other foot and people will want to forget about him and say ‘oh look, there’s someone else’.

"The big thing for James was getting in the squad, so what does he want to do now? Does he just want to stay in the squad or get in the team? That’s what he has to look at. Get in the team first and do well. We need people who are on form and he is definitely one of them."