http://shelbournefcchat.100megs35.c...opic.php?t=3750
I've said it before on this forum and I'll say it again; the best league of Ireland coverage is to be found on Radio 1 Medium Wave broadcasts. I listened to the game last night and after the game I heard the best debate about Irish football that I've ever heard which consisted of Eoin Hand, Dermot Keely and Johnny MacDonnell who were on the verge of shouting at each other with Hand getting quite upset at one stage. The radio coverage is always much better and avoids the nonsense Dolan comes out with on TV. The TV analysis usually becomes just looking and talking about replays rather than meaningful match analysis, which you always get on radio. Once again I suggest that the next time you are watching an Ireland game, at half time switch to radio MW for analysis and you will hear LOI men giving great analysis. Forget about Newstalk, RTE is much better and I suggest that more people tune in and support it.
In any case I thought the debate was so interesting and inciteful that I would try and reproduce as much as possible here in the hope that it stimulates a debate on this forum. In particular, I suppose, the overall theme of the debate was 'where do we go from after this game?'
Hand was very critical of Pat Fenlon for not introducing Houlihan and Ndo earlier (though afterwards Fenlon said in an interview that Houlihan was very sick and couldn't have played for more than 20 minutes). In the lead up to the third goal he kept saying that the goal was imminent unless somebody was introduced to midfield to get a hold. Immediately after the goal Houlihan came on, making Hand quite upset. Hand said that Shelbourne had an inferiority complex and played with no belief and that there will be no progress until this change in mindset occurs. He said Steau will be puzzled and very pleased as to why Ndo and Houlihan were only brought on at the very end as they were the only players who asked serious questions over the two legs.
It might be stated that Eoin Hand spotted the incident with Rogers and said that the Steau player hit him, Rogers hit him back and then the player hit the deck. They were all very relieved that the ref sent both players off because it very often happens that the person who throws the first dig is left on the pitch. It seems tv completely missed what happened?
Keely's comment was that despite the fact that the four goals were gifts, this changes nothing because Steau created enough chances to have got four perfectly good goals anyway.
After this Dermot Keely became quite provocative and said that Shelbourne had over-performed last year and that last night is our level. THe reason why we were conceding sloppy goals is because that is the standard of Irish football faces week in, week out. He reckons that the professionalism is helping three clubs and the rest are dying on their feet and how long is the current set up going to continue until the league implodes?
They then turned to discuss some macro issues of the league, including that there are too many clubs in Dublin (Keely agreed, saying that it could cost him his job -what about Ray Duffy?) but asked who is going to go? He said Dublin are being kept alive by Seery, UCD are an excellently run club, they won't go - someone said Pats and Johnny Mac said Rovers should be next, not Pats! In any case, Keely said the public won't go to the games and the government won't give proper support so we as a country can't deliver the goals being aspired too. Better to acknowledge this and go back to a more sustainable system because the current Summer football, professional set-up is killing everybody but three clubs.
Keely then started talking about how uncomfortable Irish players are on the ball and blamed this on how badly schoolbody football is run in Ireland. There are too many schoolboy teams and not enough quality coaching, children are trained to be competitive too early and hard workers are rewarded with medals and skills aren't developed. He said in all his career, he never learnt how to pass. He said the 4-4-2 culture is too endemic (and cited himself as at fault here). He said that what needs to happen is to make the schoolboy leagues much smaller but that won't happen because each team gives money to the governing bodies, so the governing bodies stand to gain the more clubs there are. A clear example of the "suits" choking Irish football, he said.
Johnny Mac then said that the LOI teams are so focussed on survival that they have no time or resources to build up youth academys. What happens instead that the likes of Home Farm, Cherry Orchard and Belvedere develop players and then the LOI teams have a scrap over who gets them once they are 18. This is no way to do things properly, he said.
Keely then spoke about the study he made of Rosenborg and proposed them as best practice whereby the whole community youth structure is based around the club, with youngsters being earmarked for first team senior football at a young age.
Eoin Hand then jumped in and spoke about his frustration that youngsters don't want to play for or get trials for LOI teams. He said he spent some time in Sligo and was annoied that none of the kids wanted anything to do with Sligo Rovers. He said that the club had been bled dry by English and Sottish mercenaries and was now left for dead. If they had of spent that money on putting in a youth structure, they could have a solid base now, instead they blew it all and this is what is still happening across the country. He said that there is too much of a blame culture in the LOI with the managers all complaining about the lack of action from the FAI but rarely do anything themselves. He gave an example of the Kennedy Cup in Limerick which is an Under-13s competition. He said that every year you see reps from all the English clubs there observing but nobody has ever come from the LOI. He asked Johnny Mac and Keely why they never go?
At this stage things got angry because Hand was determined to get Johnny Mac and Keely to accept their own failings here. Johnny Mac was saying that Pats are on a knife edge in the Premier division and he has no time or resources to do anything progressive. Anyway he said, all the LOI clubs are living off scraps and get no help from anybody. He said he met Stuart Pierce at a seminar in France two years ago and his job was to travel the world watching as many games as possible and then taking notes which are fed into a database accesibile to all in English football. If an English club drew Streau, he said, they could enter the database and get a big file on both the club, their players, their tactics as well as more general info on Romanian football - why can't we have something like this he asked? Keely says he hopes that Shelbourne will send Pat Fenlon off to see the next game so to learn from how Steau prepare for the Rosenberg game in contrast to last night's. Hand agreed that we are poorly developed in sending people off to learn and watch other countires' games.
Hand then gave out about the lack of sharing of knowledge, that coaches go to seminars and keep what they have learnt a secret. Similarly no knowledge is passed from generation to generation in the FAI. Kerr has to come in and make all the mistakes that Charlton and McCarthy made before he learns, but there is no system of keeping that knowledge. Throughout Irish football, short term gains for each club is the driver.
Pat Fenlon then came in and said that the schoolboy system in Ireland is our major weakness and as a consequence European players are much more comfortable on the ball giving Irish clubs a massive mountain to climb in Europe. He said that the FAI haven't organised a coaching course for two years and the people responsible don't do their job properly. Keely agreed saying that the legislators should legislate, instead they do nothing and bleed football dry. Hand got annoied again and spoke bout being caught in a blame culture, instead of complaining about the FAI, why doesn't anybody in the LOI go to the Kennedy Cup where it all starts and sign these youngsters for their youth clubs? When is somebody going to take responsibility in the league?
Johnny Mac said that ten years ago he played in the Pats team that were beaten 5-1 by Steau so there was no progress and again Hand became very angry saying that was completely unfair, that the preparation was completely better and that the results in Europe in general are far better now than then. He gave Johnny Mac a good talking down for that comment.
Keely then got annoied as he felt Fenlon was being blamed and they all cheered Shels as being the most progressive club with the most progressive manager. There were also compliments for Brian Kerr as he is trying to tackle these problems but ultimately will be judged on his results whilst the most important and long term work he does in Irish football remains invisible.
One thing which remained unsaid but I read in between the lines is that Packie Bonner has the job of being the FAI technical director but may not be up to it. Which begs the question, what is that man doing? Has he published anything? Has he been in consultation with anybody?
