Governance of the FAI

[Eirambler]

The important thing is the ringfencing, it's beneficial for all parties I think. The pressure/incentive will always be there for clubs to spend the money elsewhere if the option to do so isn't completely closed off.

I wonder whether the administration by Sport Ireland was encouraged by the FAI or whether they were told it was the only way the money was going to be made available? Again, it seems like a good move, for similar reasons to the ringfencing.

[elatedscum]

IRFU charging €160 for the Cat A tickets. https://www.rte.ie/sport/rugby/2025/...reality-potts/ i remember being sick seeing the Armenia game's Cat A tickets being €100 but €160 is hard to comprehend.

[elatedscum]

I was talking to someone a few weeks ago who works with accounts and talking about the FAI and the upcoming redundancies. he pulled up the accounts online and we paid about €2m a year in interest (while reducing the legacy debt by about €1m - so about €3m in total paid). that's the real issue in all this. this conversation was prior to their restructuring of debt over a longer timescale, which likely means more interest ultimately paid out (over a longer time).

i was saying to him is the real issue moving the debt across in a way that we're repaying the government rather than a bank - so that you half or cut in three the time it takes to be debt free. he said the governments position is they've basically already done the bailout and the FAI needs to prove that it can run itself responsibly and within its means but that's really difficult when there's still so much debt dragging it down.

Also interesting that Paul Cooke isn't taking any wages, which surprised me.

[yurt]

I'm assume the home team for the playoffs take all of the gate receipts?

Can the FAI expect to make much money having made it this far? I'm assuming they'll move a lot more season tickets now that there could be a world cup playoff in Dublin.

Does anyone have an idea how much of a dent in the debt would making the world cup proper do for the FAI?

[tetsujin1979]

IRFU charging €160 for the Cat A tickets. https://www.rte.ie/sport/rugby/2025/...reality-potts/ i remember being sick seeing the Armenia game's Cat A tickets being €100 but €160 is hard to comprehend.

They were charging €90 to sit in the gods in the upper West stand for the Japan game. An absolute rip off

[Nesta99]

I'm assume the home team for the playoffs take all of the gate receipts?

Can the FAI expect to make much money having made it this far? I'm assuming they'll move a lot more season tickets now that there could be a world cup playoff in Dublin.

Does anyone have an idea how much of a dent in the debt would making the world cup proper do for the FAI?

Group stage elimination is about €8m, last 32 €12m, 16 is 15m and then increases in much bigger amounts after. Im presuming these are minimum payments. I doubt there is UEFA like additional payments for win/draw. Huge chunk of the 1b pot goes to the club fund, disproportionately imo with 400m for their players' participation and covering potential injuries. Rovers will get money for Lopes, maybe a few LoI clubs should balance up the worth of signing a few Curacao lads this winter. But its money after money with the biggest clubs in the biggest associations getting the most money, so little redistribution of funds, more of just cycling funds around the top table.

Ticket sales proportion Im sure goes to football associations even in just the admin cost. Offical merch like new one off jerseys. Sponsorship of course. So a decent and probably lower side guesstimate would be €10m, aim at 5m net and the rest is bonus territory. Add in boost to season ticket sales, that some of the baggage with the FAI will be shed so sponsorship will improve well after. Its game changer stuff in terms of debt management, restructuring, future improvement in available funds - even if its just paying down loans to reduce the regular interest payment. It would come at a time after a lot of redundancies and cost cutting so would facilitate more clean slate type targeting of money in, even starting a bit of a reserve fund....

[backstothewall]

You would hope that the events of the last week and a bit will mark a corner being turned even if we don't make it to the World Cup.

If we were to make it the marketing opportunities will be of a different order of magnitude to anything that's ever happened in this country. A World Cup in America is a golden opportunity to do deals with American corporations who have a significant presence in Ireland. That's all of the "magnificent seven" with the exception of Nvidia.

But even what's happened already has had the incredibly important effect of clearing away the smell of death that was surrounding the FAI.

There are Irish companies out there who could be wonderful partners for Irish football. The one that really jumps to mind is RyanAir. The European Championship in 2028 will be the biggest mass movement of people in Europe this decade, and RyanAir will move more of them than anyone else. They're an Irish company, Michael O'Leary is a football fan, and they're known to use sports sponsorship as part of their marketing strategy. It's potentially a match made in heaven, but I'd say up until now they've taken a look at the FAI and concluded that a deal was as likely as not to end up being a source of embarrassment. Can you imagine the antics John Delaney would have been involved in over the last 2 games?

The book on Delaney is long closed, but we've never had a story to start the next one. Until now that is. Perhaps the likes of RyanAir, Guinness, Paddy Power etc might look again at football. And that's not just sponsorship. Corporate hospitality is a massive money spinner for the IRFU. Maybe the FAI can can start to get a better slice of that pie now. If we get through the semi final there'll be massive interest in the playoff final. If we actually get beyond that and qualify that will be true of every friendly game in the build up to the World Cup.

[Nesta99]

Until a former CEO face his day on court, I wont feel there i any moving on. The aociation may move on but the pat wont be behind them until it is shown that it was the whims of 1 that caused the financial and reputaational damage. I havent heard that the case was struck out, delays have been manufacturered but still needs to happen!

[backstothewall]

Until a former CEO face his day on court, I wont feel there i any moving on. The aociation may move on but the pat wont be behind them until it is shown that it was the whims of 1 that caused the financial and reputaational damage. I havent heard that the case was struck out, delays have been manufacturered but still needs to happen!

Even if it was a case of 1 man being responsible, the FAI were the ones who allowed him to rise to that position and gather so much power. He should do 5 years in the Joy, but the FAI can never be absolved. All they can do is demonstrate to the country that change has happened and that it will never be allowed to happen again