Why Ireland are Crap at Soccer

True, but it is an important position.

Some of my thoughts, in no particular order:

• Yes, we’re a small country so we’ll always be up against it statistically, but we’ve brought through quality players in the past, have a few at the moment and have some coming through. It takes a bit of a fluke to bring through a whole bunch at any one time. Even the big countries find this. In the past we’ve been able to rely on the granny rule to fill key gaps, but an improving economy turns off the emigration tap so it’s unlikely we’ll ever see the same number of Irish eligible UK born players as we saw in the 70s/80s/90s.
  
• A stronger domestic league would complement the existing trend of young kids going to the UK on apprentice schemes. Personally I think it’s unlikely one of our first choice internationals will at the time be playing LOI, but playing in a good LOI is already being seen as an alternative to trying your luck in the UK lower leagues.
  
• We’re unlikely to ever have the bulk of our team playing regularly for the best sides in England. Only Finnan really fits this bill, then maybe Robbie and Duff who more than held his own at Chelsea. Given is good enough, Dunne maybe and Doyle could get there. Then again, the countries we’re competing with (second tier and third tier countries) are hardly well represented at these clubs either, but they do have players playing at the top of the second tier leagues in Europe. As a respected poster over on chatsoccer frequently cites, how can you play internationals with players who don’t play internationally?
  
• It's a global game / industry and like any Irish exporter struggling to cope with intense foreign competition we should find new markets or better develop the home market. A more competitive home market and other European markets are required to fill the gaps in my opinion.
  
• International football is on the wane in terms of its influence in the overall scheme of things. In club vs country conflicts there’ll only ever be one winner. I think the big showpiece finals apart, the governing bodies could do more to re-establish international football as the pinnacle of the sport.
  
• Vanity investors taking their money to the UK rather that investing it at home doesn’t help. I know the late 70s Shamrock Rovers venture failed (Giles aiming for UEFA Cup success, ex-anglos returning home…) but it’d be interesting to see a few of the Irish mega rich investing at home. I mean if Peterborough is seen as an attractive investment for Darragh MacAnthony, why not a LOI club?
  
• Is the system really that badly broken anyway? An injury-time equaliser, a very late miss by Keane, a deflected goal conceded in Stuttgart, a late miss by Dunne, missing a 2 time CL finalist full back, missing or not having a match sharp Given for critical games, a stubborn manager who doesn’t really understand how to set out a team & who fails to learn some pretty obvious lessons from other games, and we’re still (nominally) in contention to qualify?

If we held out for one minute on Saturday, this thread wouldn't even have existed.

Thats the sad thing.

There are so many discussions going on here it's hard to know where to start but as has been pointed out there are 3 main elements to "Football in this country"
1 - Junior/Under age football
2 - National League
3 - National Team

I honestly think that if our under age system and our National League improve it will inevitably improve the national team. The best players will always look to go overseas to bigger leagues where there is more money but is it unrealistic to look for a 10 team top flight with attendances of Circa 10k at each of the 5 games on a weekend? To me that would be a sustainable league that would be generating sufficient cash to keep players from leaving at 16.
For me the FAI would do a lot worse than to look at the centre of excellence that the FA set up at Lilleshall to develop young players. It has since been abandoned as the EPL clubs want players to remain in their own acadameys
but A proper centre of excellence with top class coahing (Liam Brady would be an ideal candidate) where players would live in and can be developed would go a long way to improving the underage teams and in turn these players would feed into the national league which would improve the standard of the league.

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Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

[*]Is the system really that badly broken anyway? ...we’re still (nominally) in contention to qualify?[/LIST]

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The problem with that is that the relative success of the international team has masked the massive problems with in Irish football.

The point you make that the LOI is never really going to provide the players to the international team is true. However, a strong LOI would raise the general level of players from Ireland, and particularly give young Irish players a far more appealing environment in which to see if they really are good enough for the premiership etc.

Of course the cream of Irish talent will head to bigger leagues, but that’s the cae with most small European nations (Holland, Sweden, Denmark). Denmark has a population of 5.5million. Their football clubs regularly get 10-15k at each game. The Belgium crowds average something similar. No LOI fan thinks we should be getting 20-30k per game but if the league averaged 7-10k at every game, there's no doubt Irish football, as a whole, would improve.

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Originally Posted by Dodge

The problem with that is that the relative success of the international team has masked the massive problems with in Irish football.

The point you make that the LOI is never really going to provide the players to the international team is true. However, a strong LOI would raise the general level of players from Ireland, and particularly give young Irish players a far more appealing environment in which to see if they really are good enough for the premiership etc.

Of course the cream of Irish talent will head to bigger leagues, but that’s the cae with most small European nations (Holland, Sweden, Denmark). Denmark has a population of 5.5million. Their football clubs regularly get 10-15k at each game. The Belgium crowds average something similar. No LOI fan thinks we should be getting 20-30k per game but if the league averaged 7-10k at every game, there's no doubt Irish football, as a whole, would improve.

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Could you really see that many people going to LOI games?
I don't think we have the population centres to sustain that over a season.

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Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

Could you really see that many people going to LOI games?
I don't think we have the population centres to sustain that over a season.

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As I pointed out, Denmark have a population of 5.5m and Copenhagen get average crowds of 23k, Odense get averages of 10k. Only reason LOI games aren't well attended is that football fans look to the UK first (facilities play a part but thats obviously part of the vicious money circle)

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Originally Posted by Dodge

As I pointed out, Denmark have a population of 5.5m and Copenhagen get average crowds of 23k, Odense get averages of 10k. Only reason LOI games aren't well attended is that football fans look to the UK first (facilities play a part but thats obviously part of the vicious money circle)

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Fair enough, according to wikipedia, Odense has a population of 150,000 making it between Cork and Limerick in terms of population, but does soccer have any other major competitors for attendance, equivalent to GAA and Rugby in Limerick and Cork?
Copenhagen has a population in or around 1.8m, making it about the same as Dublin, but are Copenhagen the only club side there, i.e. are there 5 or 6 clubs in the area all vying for attendance? Again, there's GAA and Rugby in Dublin, does Copenhagen have the same attractions?
Money comes into it too, I went to 5 of Limerick's GAA games this year, all the home soccer internationals, Limerick 37 games, underage internationals, I would have gone to the rugby if I could have laid my hands on tickets, and made it to some of Munster's home games in Thomond Park, but I realise eventually something there will give, there's no way I can go on attending all these games.
For many people, GAA will traditionally come first, in places rugby is the main sport, for some LOI is the only way to go, but for a majority given the choice, it will be last.

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Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

Fair enough, according to wikipedia, Odense has a population of 150,000 making it between Cork and Limerick in terms of population, but does soccer have any other major competitors for attendance, equivalent to GAA and Rugby in Limerick and Cork?
Copenhagen has a population in or around 1.8m, making it about the same as Dublin, but are Copenhagen the only club side there, i.e. are there 5 or 6 clubs in the area all vying for attendance? Again, there's GAA and Rugby in Dublin, does Copenhagen have the same attractions?
Money comes into it too, I went to 5 of Limerick's GAA games this year, all the home soccer internationals, Limerick 37 games, underage internationals, I would have gone to the rugby if I could have laid my hands on tickets, and made it to some of Munster's home games in Thomond Park, but I realise eventually something there will give, there's no way I can go on attending all these games.
For many people, GAA will traditionally come first, in places rugby is the main sport, for some LOI is the only way to go, but for a majority given the choice, it will be last.

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Brondby and FC Copenhagen are the two main teams in the city

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Originally Posted by Dodge

the vicious money circle

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Will Bohs' windfall have an effect?

What would / could happen if another Derry City situation came about., i.e., out of nowhere a team brings thousands to away games and has huge attendances at home? Could the game take advantage this time?

I went to Wasps vs Leinster last April or whenever and among the Leinster "ultras" were soccer supporting mates of mine from Tallaght and other parts of Dublin who just loved being part of a vociferous and decent sized support who actually had a half-decent / important spectacle to watch. These guys would be out at Rovers in a flash if Cork or Derry or whoever were to bring a few thousand fans along to a game.

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Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

These guys would be out at Rovers in a flash if Cork or Derry or whoever were to bring a few thousand fans along to a game.

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I don't think fans in Dublin would every come out to see the away team, or their fans.

And BTW we're Richer than Bohs ;)

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Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

For many people, GAA will traditionally come first, in places rugby is the main sport, for some LOI is the only way to go, but for a majority given the choice, it will be last.

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In Dublin the GAA ranks down the list of people's interests. In fact I only know one person who if asked what his favourite sport is would say GAA. The problem is that they all support British teams. I have no doubt that football is the number one sport in practically the whole country. Obviously LOI football isn't

Your point about money may ring through if people didn't spend €100 easily on a night out for themselves. They choose not to spend their money on going to football, but in reality, its not that expensive (and certainly not as expensive as going to Dublin GAA games or Leinster rugby)

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Originally Posted by OwlsFan

Hmmmm, let me think. "Why Ireland hasn't won the World Cup?". A population of a few million, most of whom play the national game, Gaelic football or hurling and where playing soccer by them was banned up to a decade or so ago.

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The ban was lifted in 1971, 36 years ago Owlsfan. Not "a decade or so ago."

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Originally Posted by OwlsFan

Other than Holland, I am struggling to think of a country of comparable size that has achieved anything of note in world or European football.

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Holland has 4 times our population so in a footballing sense we can't really be compared to them.

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Originally Posted by Dodge

In Dublin the GAA ranks down the list of people's interests. In fact I only know one person who if asked what his favourite sport is would say GAA. The problem is that they all support British teams. I have no doubt that football is the number one sport in practically the whole country. Obviously LOI football isn't

Your point about money may ring through if people didn't spend €100 easily on a night out for themselves. They choose not to spend their money on going to football, but in reality, its not that expensive (and certainly not as expensive as going to Dublin GAA games or Leinster rugby)

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Dublin regularly sell out Croke Park, that's 80,000+ fans. How many of them go to any of the Dublin-based soccer teams? How many of the teams based in Dublin sell out with the same regularity, even with stadiums with vastly reduced capacities compared to Croke Park?

For a country with such a small population we have done reasonably well in world football, so I wouldn't say Ireland are crap at football.

Don't know if anyone made this point previously as I stopped reading after the first post

The GAA is crap, full of ignorant culchies.

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Originally Posted by paul_oshea

The GAA is crap, full of ignorant culchies.

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Beautiful, nothing like a sweeping generalisation to show how superior you really are.

Have you met Paul? He's an ignorant culchie.

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Originally Posted by endabob1

Beautiful, nothing like a sweeping generalisation to show how superior you really are.

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I think he was joking.

Not sure though.

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Originally Posted by paul_oshea

The GAA is crap, full of ignorant culchies.

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I think you need a smilie for the sarcasm .

Torn, It was done in jest, in an ironic twist really. As when the GAA gets mentioned, someone usually comes on and says something along those lines, so I thought I might as well get in there first.

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I think you need a smilie for the sarcasm .

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Not, if you are not being sarcastic.

Stuts, good to see you know me so well :D

Just reading this post now and Ireland are crap at the moment but we haven't always been crap, only in the last few years we have. It's down to the players and Managment that are picked/selected to produce the goods.

I think we could be alot better if the proper players are picked to start games and if we had a different Manager, any Manager...

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Originally Posted by backtowalsall

The Ireland team on display, with Doyle and a small few recent exceptions aside, have nothing to do with Irish football. They were trained and make their career in England, and have succeded in spite of the structures here, not because of them.

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I'll highlight that bit again to see if you can get my point which is embedded in it. There are no structures in Irish football. The Irish performances and side have nothing to do with Irish football. So contrary to convenient belief, if Ireland are doing well, that doesn't mean Irish football is in good health.

If there's one thing that awful disgrace of a thing that is the GAA proves is the capability of Irish people to devote themselves to a local cause.

If there's one thing that the detestable Leinster Senior Schools Cup proves is that if you have a sport strong locally in schools, you develop a national team that is well respected and rated highly. Denis Hickie and his 30 international tries for Ireland played in that.

Neither of these are present in Irish football and that is why we are crap at football. To have solid foundation to build anything you need determination, willing and a bottom up approach. All missing from Team Ireland.

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Originally Posted by robbiesdrogs

right so im biting too.geography???3 belfast teams 4 dublin ones is hardly a great spread,you could have one from louth(ahem) meath(if the stadium goes up) longford sligo kilkenny waterford wicklow donegal.then you mention finance and include shelbourne and mention grounds too.well not alone are they broke but there off out to morton soon.

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The reason for the spread was the million people east of the Bann, and the almost 2 million in Dublin. Longford has a population of only 31,000, Sligo 58,000 Kilkenny 80,000, and the counties bordering Dublin are for good or ill now Dublin's commuter belt. That means good roads to the Dublin teams, who they can watch with their mates from work.

I take the point though about a team in the Boyne Valley. That greater boyne/oriel area has Drogheda United, Dundalk, Newry City and Armagh City quite close to each other. But i only named 10 teams in a proposed 14-16 team league, and with a 10,000 seater stadium, Drogheda would be impossible to turn down. I was actually in united park about ten years ago, to see Drogheda play Ason Villa. I think a guy playing for Villa called Staunton arranged it, his brother was playing for the Drogs. If google earth is recent it hasn't changed much. But Dalian Atkinson kicking the ball completly out of the stadium and down the road really sums up the problems of football in the country. It should be a lot harder to kick the ball out of the stadium completely.

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Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

Dublin regularly sell out Croke Park, that's 80,000+ fans. How many of them go to any of the Dublin-based soccer teams?

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Isn't that the point I'm making? I can guarentee you there's more football fans in Dublin that GAA, there's more football players in Dublin than GAA. What are you arguing with?

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Originally Posted by paul_oshea

The GAA is crap, full of ignorant culchies.

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I knew we'd wear you down ;)

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Originally Posted by Dodge

Isn't that the point I'm making? I can guarentee you there's more football fans in Dublin that GAA, there's more football players in Dublin than GAA. What are you arguing with?

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I'm not sure to be honest, I guess that if the GAA with a smaller fanbase can regualarly sell 80,000 tickets to Dublin fans, why isn't the combined total of attendances at home soccer games even close to that?

PS just using soccer to distinguish between football and gaelic football, I rarely use that term

If an All-Ireland league were to be pursued, it would have to reflect the real clubs with existing support and try to build on it. It wouldn't work with forced regional clubs like the mentioned Connacht FC which Sligo wouldn't support because they have a rivalry with Galway and would reject a Galway based team. Here is a 4 tier idea with the fourth tier really just being regional leagues that could go deeper:

IRISH PREMIER LEAGUE

Linfield FC
Ballymena Utd FC
Glentoran FC
Dungannon Swifts FC
Coleraine FC
Portadown FC
Cliftonville FC
Derry City
Shamrock Rovers
Bohemians
St. Patrick's Athletic
Cork City
Waterford United
Galway United
Sligo Rovers
Drogheda United

Promotion / Relegation: [three up (one via 3-4-5-6 playoff) from First Division, three down]

IRISH FIRST DIVISION

UCD
Longford Town
Bray Wanderers
Cobh Ramblers
Finn Harps
Dundalk
Limerick 37
Shelbourne
Monaghan United
Glenavon FC
Newry City FC
Lisburn Distillery FC
Loughgall FC
Armagh City FC
Larne FC
Institute FC

Promotion / Relegation: [three up (one via 3-4-5-6 playoff) from Second Division, three down]


IRISH SECOND DIVISION


Kildare County
Athlone Town
Wexford Youths
Kilkenny City
ROI TEAM (Castlebar Celtic?)
ROI TEAM (Fingal FC? Letterkenny Rovers?)
ROI TEAM (South East FC?)
ROI TEAM (Clonmel Town?)
ROI TEAM (Kerry League?)
Crusaders FC
Limavady Utd FC
Donegal Celtic FC
Ballymoney Utd FC
Ballyclare Comrades FC
Ards FC
Bangor FC

Promotion / Relegation: [two up from Regional division playoffs, two down]

Below this point it goes regional, four divisions Ulster, Connacht/Ulster (includes all of Connacht parts of Ulster in ROI), Leinster, Munster. Four division winners play playoffs to see who gets the two promotion spots into Division 3.

Used the IFA team rankings from the thread in the Northern Ireland league section here to determine the Northern team splits. Each of the top 3 tiers gets 16 teams, 9 from ROI leagues 7 from Northern Leagues. Derry City being one of the teams in the Premier League would give it an 8/8 split of teams based in ROI and Northern Ireland in the opening year. Where teams fall in subsequent years is based on their performance.

5 Filler ROI teams in Second Division are just ideas based on what was speculated for LoI "A Championship" teams in other threads.

4 tiers is way too much for a country our size, 2 tiers is probably too much if you want your top tier to compete at a reasonable level in Europe.
I don't think an all-Ireland league is a reality so I would suggest a top tier of 10 (ideally professional) teams where you can have 10 genuinely competitve teams, a bigger (16 team) second level where teams are semi-pro / Amatuer.
Below that the provincial senior leagues which can feed into the second tier where required.

I would go for 14-16 with not promotion or relegation ever. But 2 tiers would be plently, with no promotion or relegation for the first couple of years to allow it to bed in.

There reaches a stage with the likes of clonmel town and ballyclare comrades where their lot in life is provincial amateur leages. Tthey will probably be the best sides there, but to maintain even semi-professional football puts a strain on the finances which will damage youth development in the long run. If those sorts of towns develop a player they need the club focusing on getting them to league football. Not holding them back waiting on transfer fees and trying tohold on to them for to long in the hope they can get them a promotion which they will never be able to maintain