Maybe not mad as hell, but Heimir Hallgrímsson has had enough. That was the unmissable, if implicit, message from the Ireland manager yesterday. This isn’t a man for soapboxes and jabbed fingers, but he knows how to make a point.

And in his engaging and understated way, Hallgrímsson fought back. He bemoaned ‘lies’ spread about his camp, and presumably last weekend’s drama. He threatened to review the terms of media engagement.

And most important of all, he spoke with palpable feeling of the pride he feels in the players for what they have endured. Ten days into an exhausting experience, the mood has turned around the Irish squad. What remains to be seen is if it has among the public, too.

Months of grandstanding and preaching gave way to hectoring and abusing over the last week, which made how the players responded in Debrecen all the more noteworthy.

This is a group worthy of admiration and respect. A TV audience of near half a million confirmed ongoing public affiliation with the most popular team in the land.

There are tentative hopes that, despite the social media onslaught against the players — a protest account on X was accusing them of betrayal again yesterday — the reaction in the Aviva Stadium tonight could be more supportive than seemed likely, or even possible, a week ago.

That, though, is just one more unknown in a window that has admitted precious little light. If Hallgrímsson can be no more certain than any of us what the reception will be from fans tonight, he is foursquare behind the belief that this is a group worthy of admiration and respect.

‘Again, people will have different opinions, and I can’t put myself in the shoes of people with strong opinions either way,’ he shrugged when asked if the bond with the supporters that strengthened a year ago is in danger of loosening now. ‘I just hope going forward that we will be united, and I think the players have done this week with grace and dignity and represented the national team the best way they can.

‘The decision to play was not the players, but we’ve played the game and I think they did it with absolute the best way they could, raising awareness of the issues at the same time. It’s worldwide; it’s worldwide attention they raised, so helping whoever is protesting, it even helped to raise that awareness.

‘It’s difficult to do it in a better way; we can never do it to please everyone. That was always going to be a no-win situation.’

That mention of the players’ gestures before the Israel game helping the cause that many are using to justify now abusing the players for betraying, sounded like a forlorn effort to win over the more extreme activists.

There’s no chance of that happening, but that was the only such allusion in the 20-plus minutes Hallgrímsson spoke in Abbotstown yesterday. Security was significant on the way to the headquarters of the FAI for the briefing, with two different checkpoints to pass, the second of which, outside the offices of the association, required proof of ID.

That’s understandable given the toxicity of the past week. Hallgrímsson’s diplomatic mention of everyone learning from this when asked bout the level of support from the FAI skilfully evaded any meaningful public discussion of his relationship with his employers.

There were claims last Saturday night, as the aftershocks of a tumultuous day finally died down, that there were significant tensions between the two. But yesterday there was an appreciation from the manager that these are uncharted and extraordinary times.

This isn’t a man who appears in thrall to every emotional impulse. He was, though, a man who wasn’t going to take a step back here — a stance that was taken by David Courell and Paul Cooke when they appeared before a typically overwrought and directionless Oireachtas committee yesterday afternoon.

That triumph of heat over light contrasted with Hallgrímsson’s deliberate take here of the Nations League, taken care of with as little fuss as possible. This would be a notable challenge in any window; given the distractions around the game, which have become the entire story of this fortnight, getting a result for Ireland is both challenging and, to many, almost beside the point.

Not to Hallgrímsson — and he wasn’t afraid to say it. This is about football, a point he made when stressing that Gavin Bazunu was a much-loved part of a tight group.

‘He was always in our group, and it just shows the character of these players that we are united, we are going forward, we are focused on doing well for Ireland,’ he said. ‘That is what matters to these players: they want to play football, and they want to represent Ireland the best way they can.’

And the truth is they did that four days ago. Doing it again tonight could just get a reaction from the home crowd that shows their true feelings — not just about this group, but also about what they’ve had to endure.