I'm not sure on the rules and whatnot, but I'd be surprised if it was Adams, rather than McGuinness. Adams is a really poor debater (as made painfully clear in the leaders' debates here prior to the last Dáil election)
Is he? A pity, his speeches (the ones I know at least) are not bad at all. But okay, debating and delivering a speech are to different things.
and has rather too many eh...issues at this time in particular that he'd prefer avoid.
What do you mean exactly? The incestuous rapist issues in his family? Or some local politics stuff I'm unaware about?
Not necessarily your skills at fault at all. I and my Ulster accent used to get that a lot (particularly with English people actually).
Yeah, the Northern Irish dialect is very singular, at least to me. But the fact that my vocal English is far from good doesn't make things easier