France legend Michel Platini believes David Healy's European Championship
scoring record will take some beating.
And Northern Ireland manager Nigel Worthington has vowed that he will never
drop the country's top goalscorer - even if he continues to find himself out
of favour at club level.
Healy will be presented with an award by Platini - who is now president of
UEFA - before tonight's Windsor Park friendly with Georgia after his 13
goals in Euro 2008 qualifying broke the record set by Croatian star Davor
Suker.
Platini himself knew where the net was during his career, scoring nine of
his country's 14 goals as they won the 1984 European Championship.
"The outstanding performance of David Healy in the qualifying
competition of the European Championship and his goal tally of 13 goals is a
new record and deserves to be recognised," Platini said.
"I am sure that this record will last for some time to come and will be
hard to beat. This is why I will be presenting him with a special award to
celebrate his fantastic achievement."
Healy currently finds himself out of the first-team picture at Fulham
following his £1.5million move from Leeds United last summer, but his place
in the Northern Ireland team is secure under Worthington.
"I would love all my players to be playing every week at their clubs,
but I don't think that will be the case," said Worthington.
"If David Healy isn't playing regular first-team football I won't be
leaving him out of the side because we don't have six or seven
centre-forwards to pick and chose from of that quality and that ability to
replace him."
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