Fenlon calls for league summit

I remember reading an interview with Gerry Matthews when he was our owner and he said that there was a meeting of clubs and nobody would agree with anything apart from the shorter season.

Edit - Found a different quote on it from Gerry

GM: At the end of 2008 there was a meeting in Sligo among the clubs. My thinking was that it would be a meeting to discuss the problems that clubs were having but the meeting was dominated by clubs giving out about the FAI and this, that and whatever. I suggested that we should iron out our own problems first and work in unity with each other but nothing ever came of it. Most clubs don't think the same way I think. They all focus on their first team and put all their expenditure into that. At that time they didn't want to have an agreement on what way the wage structure should be in the off season. That is something every club would benefit from. A player can come to us in the off season and say that another club is offering him a 52 week contract. If every club agreed to offer an agreed maximum 40 week contract at least we would know that every club was singing of the same hymn sheet. What is wrong is that all the clubs are so competitive that they will always offer more than the other to try and reap the benefits of winning a league or qualifying for Europe. Unfortunately what we have seen from the bigger clubs in recent years is that it doesn't work. They don't reap rewards, they actually penalise themselves. Clubs want a quick fix. They don’t want to work together for the long term. They want to win the league and they feel if they tie in with the rest of the clubs in the league it will hinder their chances. That's my feeling on it. I would love if there was a standard format and certain procedures that every club stuck to but others don't want that. If that had happened then we might not have seen what happened at Cork, Derry and so on. There are only 22 clubs in the league and we seem to find it hard hard to work and agree on anything. A lot of it is fan driven. Clubs come under a lot of pressure, Dundalk are no different, to sign players before you lose them and to pay big money to attract the best players. I have no problems with that if you have the finances to do it. The reality is that a lot of the clubs don't. They might make signings and get a clap on the back for it but secretly they know that they may not be able to finance it. It's a short term fix and that's no good for any club or for the league in general.

Some of the responses here are a good indicator of why Irish football does actually need a summit.

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Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

Some of the responses here are a good indicator of why Irish football does actually need a summit.

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so they can talk ****e just like we do?

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Originally Posted by Dodge

so they can talk ****e just like we do?

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The first step is to talk.
Its a beginning not an end.

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Originally Posted by disgruntled

The first step is to talk.
Its a beginning not an end.

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There's no shortage of talkers in LOI circles

There's an obvious joke about Fenlon and a summit there somewhere.

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Originally Posted by Dodge

There's no shortage of talkers in LOI circles

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The problem is getting them talking to each other & for the greater good of the League of Ireland.

Brian Kerr has clearly been reading this forum 😂 calling for a task force to be set up to improve and promote the league on soccer rep last night

Is it legal for clubs to discuss with each other their own pay structures. The PFAI who are a major stakeholder in all this would/could object to it as it's in the players best interest to get the best deal for themselves.

I think clubs could benefit from shared knowledge. For instance every club should want to know what the cork promotions officer is doing. To get 5k in for the first couple of home games was a massive achievement. Knowledge shared in that instance would not damage cork and would vastly improve the promotion officers of other clubs.

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Originally Posted by jinxy lilywhite

I think clubs could benefit from shared knowledge. For instance every club should want to know what the cork promotions officer is doing. To get 5k in for the first couple of home games was a massive achievement. Knowledge shared in that instance would not damage cork and would vastly improve the promotion officers of other clubs.

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hhhhmmm not sure Cork would agree.
Not saying it would happen like this but ..... Cork crowds are up.... they have a few key marketing tricks that have reaped rewards, resulting in Corks matchday revenue being substantially higher than say Pats/Dundalk... resulting in Cork having more cash to spend on the budget... meaning they can potentially get a few players Pats/Dundalk are after.... and then Pats come knocking saying....we want to know how you made more money than us, so we can erode your financial advantage over us .... I can take a guess at what Corks reaction would be

Maybe not but then that raises the question to Pats on how do they stay consistently at the top of Irish football with virtually the same 1200 to 1800 supporters.

Some areas I understand that you can not share but there are other areas that can be shared if clubs stopped looking at everything in the micro and looked at the macro as the league as a whole.

For the league to improve them all clubs must progress together. It's a process that won't be done overnight and 10 years is probably an optimistic timeline.

We have a big core fanbase and a huge bandwagon, in league of Ireland terms. Sure it's down to aggressive marketing, but not all many clubs would achieve similar results.

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Originally Posted by jinxy lilywhite

Is it legal for clubs to discuss with each other their own pay structures. The PFAI who are a major stakeholder in all this would/could object to it as it's in the players best interest to get the best deal for themselves.

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The PFAI aren't a union so I don't think they'd have any real grounds to object. SIPTU is the players' union and they could object on the grounds any kind of sharing of wage levels would negatively affect the players' ability to negotiate a wage, and I'd be fairly sure it would be upheld. As far as I know, most clubs now publish their audited accounts so the gross wage spend can be found for anyone who wants it, but as we've seen with Derry and others in the past that can be misrepresented even there.

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Originally Posted by jinxy lilywhite

Maybe not but then that raises the question to Pats on how do they stay consistently at the top of Irish football with virtually the same 1200 to 1800 supporters.

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I think everyone knows the answer to this. We have never claimed it was down to our crowds or merchandise sales.

just to be clear, i agree that the league as a whole needs to draw up a new blue print , maybe a five year plan, and it probably would work better if everyone pooled their ideas together and discussed what worked and what didnt...... i just dont think it'll happen

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Originally Posted by Louth4sam

A player can come to us in the off season and say that another club is offering him a 52 week contract. If every club agreed to offer an agreed maximum 40 week contract at least we would know that every club was singing of the same hymn sheet.

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Businessman in wanting to drive down wages and job security shocker.

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Originally Posted by Sheridan

Businessman in wanting to drive down wages and job security shocker.

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In Loi? You are joking right?

Munster's crowds for league games down. There marketing campaign isn't reaping rewards though I suppose last weekend's win over Leinster will bring in the bandwagoners of the sport.

Taking a look at Limerick FC, how can they increase their support base? In fairness they are doing work within the community.

The league doesn't get spoken of much. Everyone heard about a Dublin derby called off due to a divet! The GAA championships, the Pro 12, GAA club Championships and the action from across the water dominate sporting discussions and the media in general as well I suppose.

It's some tsunami of a time to try and swim against. The league needs weeks of exposure for the right reasons.

Thought I'd stick this in ....Surely it's about time that we handed over the U 21 National team to a fully League of Ireland team !At least this way,players can be called on to train by the manager at pretty short notice.This would have the knock on effect of giving younger players ambition !!!

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Originally Posted by Brusher

Thought I'd stick this in ....Surely it's about time that we handed over the U 21 National team to a fully League of Ireland team !At least this way,players can be called on to train by the manager at pretty short notice.This would have the knock on effect of giving younger players ambition !!!

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I wouldn't agree with the U21 team being a LoI team only. If lads who've gone across the water are good enough, they should not be cut off. When Mick McCarthy was in charge there was a game or two between a League of Ireland XI and Ireland B. I think they should have one or two such games a year.

People may remember an Irish Olympic qualifying squad that was made up of loi players. One game against Hungary attracted a large crowd to Milltown; Noel King would have been on the team. I thing the crowds decline after that game, won 4-0?, and not sure if the idea only lasted one qualifying campaign. What are the rules for Olympics now, u-23 but did Beckham play in the last one. Anyone know the manager of that Irish team; Liam Touhy?