It was suggested somewhere that I would be applying for the post, and that I had already spoken with Arsene Wenger on the subject.

Firstly, I most certainly won't be applying for the job and, second, I didn't speak with Wenger about the job as I'm totally committed to my role as Arsenal's Youth Development director and Academy manager.

Even if applications were sought, this is not the sort of job someone should apply for. Any appointment should be preceded by a careful, considered, educated search for the best candidate. It should be a case of the FAI, or its consultants, identifying the right sort of manager to guide the team to the next World Cup finals, not some public beauty contest.

When someone like Philippe Troussier is putting his hand up for almost every international post going, that only cheapens the whole process.

However, as I mentioned on television, if I was approached about the job in good faith, I would discuss it. Frankly, I would be interested because I would relish the challenge, and I believe I could meet the requirements.

But . . . and this is an important 'but' . . . if the FAI, its team of consultants, or whoever is charged with finding the next Ireland manager, does the job properly, it's likely that my phone won't be ringing.

Because this trawl for Staunton's successor could end up being a waste of time if the right parameters aren't put in place. A scatter-gun approach with no clear picture of the ideal coach in mind will probably only lead to another botched appointment.

After the failed solo run by John Delaney and his sidekicks in their efforts to replace Brian Kerr, I don't have a problem in principle with the FAI's decision to farm out the responsibility this time, although it goes without saying that those involved in the selection process have to be competent football people.

More important is that whoever carries out the search must have a clear profile of the sort of manager who will fit Ireland's bill. For my money, the new man must have had success whether it be by winning trophies or by securing promotion.

Success is a vital ingredient in the package, and even when you go back to Jack Charlton, who had no experience as an international manager before he came to Ireland, he had guided Middlesbrough up to the old First Division, so he knew what it took to build a winning team.

I wouldn't care about age, and I wouldn't care about the fact that someone hadn't coached at international level, however, any prospective manager would have to know how to handle the media. Staunton suffered at the hands of the press because he wasn't sure of himself, he wasn't experienced enough and he wasn't strong enough at times. Equally, Steve McClaren's now in trouble because he hasn't been able to win the English media over.

I've heard talk that this might be a headhunting exercise, but I take head-hunting to mean that someone could be persuaded to quit one job in favour of another. I don't see the FAI going down the road of paying compensation on top of a large salary. So, essentially what we're talking about here is finding the right coach, who also happens to be unemployed.

That does reduce the list of candidates, and while I tend to disagree with Eamon Dunphy more often than not, his suggestion that the likes of George Graham or Paul Jewell could do the job is perfectly acceptable to me. If Graham has been out of the loop for a time, he has an excellent track record, winning six trophies at Arsenal and one at Tottenham, while Jewell has had success in terms of promotion with Wigan.

Although I can't see it happening, there is a possibility that the appointment could be held off until after next summer's European Championship finals and, again, I wouldn't have a problem with that as long the FAI had cast-iron assurances that their man was free to take the Ireland job immediately after those finals.

And anyway, no matter what anyone says, every managerial appointment is something of a gamble. It's not an exact science. Marcello Lippi had tremendous success at Juventus before moving to Inter Milan where things didn't work out. Inter Milan let him go, and he won the World Cup with Italy. So, you never know for sure.

What we do know now with the benefit of hindsight is that the Staunton gamble failed.

At the risk of repeating myself, I wanted Steve to succeed, but after several hugely disappointing performances, and in the bleak aftermath of the draw with Cyprus, the decision was right to terminate his contract.

If it was undoubtedly a bruising experience, Steve had been in the game long enough to understand both its cut-throat nature, as well as the harsh reality of how every decision and every move is carried out in the media glare. An offer is always something you can refuse, and he would've been much better off had he been groomed as an assistant under a more experienced coach.

In the end though, John Delaney and the FAI came out of it worse than Staunton. At the outset, Delaney could have emphasised that there were precedents for appointing recent former players to international jobs such as Mark Hughes, Jurgen Klinsmann and Marco Van Basten. But he never adequately explained the reasons behind the choice of selection.

Then later, when things were beginning to slide alarmingly, Delaney continued to claim that everything was working, and that Staunton would see out his four-year-contract.

The chief executive may be competent in commercial and administrative areas, but I'm not sure if he could sense how glaring the inadequacies were following the away games in Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

If it's the case that he's not supposed to understand the subtleties of selection and tactics, then perhaps it's about time that the FAI considered taking on an experienced consultant with a long career in the game to act as an advisor when it comes to reviewing performances.

I accept that since the achievements of the late 1980s and '90s, expectation has been high, and at times maybe too high, but I'm still convinced that we can have our days in the sun. At Euro 88, we almost knocked out the eventual winners, two years later we made the World Cup quarter-finals, and should have done it again in 2002. Greece have shown what is possible with good organisation, self-belief and some talent, and for me, Ireland's current crop of players is not far short of Mick McCarthy's squad at those 2002 finals.

The very least we should expect is to be in contention to qualify for either World Cup or European Championship finals right up until the last group game. Staunton, the choice of the FAI, failed way before time on that count.

No matter that the FAI administrators appear now to be absolving themselves of responsibility as a new search gets under way, you still have to be worried that this could turn into another farce. We don't know the calibre of the consultant, or consultants, who will be entrusted with the task, and we don't know if they'll be given a profile of the right sort of manager Ireland needs.

They know my phone number, but if this selection process is carried out professionally by football people with genuine expertise in the area, they should realise that I probably don't have the CV to be in the frame.

We live in hope that they'll get the right man.