Keith Fahey on the LOI

[Seagull]

http://www.independent.ie/sport/socc...-34469856.html

[White Horse]

"If there's one word that's missing, it's consistency.

There's huge gaps in standards under every heading, from where clubs train, to how often they train, to the quality of their players.

On the pitch, you could have two or three ex-internationals on one side and two or three lads who've just come straight out of the Leinster Senior League on the other."

I just picked out three sentences. People go on about facilities but it is the lack of a top division with at leat 6-8 teams of a similar standard that stops players and teams developing to their full potential.

[disgruntled]

http://www.independent.ie/sport/socc...-34469856.html

Interesting read.
Thanks for that.

[seand]

Great article, Fahey comes across very well

[placid casual]

There is no investment in LOI, either from FAIlures or sugar daddy's. Clubs want the money from European qualification so spend everything they have on playing/ management staff and nothing on facilities.

Btw- his point on towell is bang on the money.

[Mr A]

Very fair piece I thought. The one quibble would be that it's not necessarily such a bad thing to have ex internationals playing lads straight out of the LSL. It's not like the ex Ireland players in the league have really been able to massively dominate games or anything.

[Dodge]

Very fair piece I thought. The one quibble would be that it's not necessarily such a bad thing to have ex internationals playing lads straight out of the LSL. It's not like the ex Ireland players in the league have really been able to massively dominate games or anything.

Fahey was both at one stage.

My only issue is that there's no acknowledgment that pretty much every penny that comes into a LOI club is spent on the first team. Either through wages or facilities. The facilities and services may not be great but with so much of revenue going into players pockets, there's little room for investment

[Charlie Darwin]

It's an interesting point. For all the work the FAI have done on ensuring clubs stick to budgets based on income (and largely it's worked), even compared with five years ago the European money/lack of domestic prize money is incentivising clubs to shoot for the top 3/4 rather than develop at underage. Liam Buckley, to his credit, is showing that both can be done to an extent but even then Pats pick up a lot of their players in their late teens.

[TonyD]

My only issue is that there's no acknowledgment that pretty much every penny that comes into a LOI club is spent on the first team. Either through wages or facilities. The facilities and services may not be great but with so much of revenue going into players pockets, there's little room for investment

I'd agree with that. It's a good article and hard to disagree with much of it, but on the one hand to say that players are only paid for 40 weeks rather than 52 and talk about facilities etc, and then state in the next breath that ticket prices are too high and should be a tenner, well great. But that's less money for clubs to spend on wages and facilities, and I don't see anything out there to fill the gap. I think 15 quid for a ticket is reasonable enough.