Eligibility Rules, Okay

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Originally Posted by geysir

Did anything known happen in order to awaken the IFA's curiosity in 1994 about the eligibility of northern Irish nationals to play for the FAI or was it just a sudden onset of paranoia and they tried to get FIFA to take action to preempt the possible flood of talent to the FAI?
in the modern era, was Gerry Crossley the first northern born irish national to opt for the FAI in 1996?

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I know he wasn't northern-born, but it may have been related to Alan Kernaghan? He first lined out for us in 1992. Complete speculation, mind. Not aware of anything else.

Or as Paul suggests, maybe our up-turn in fortunes led to a thinking that we would pose a threat or more attractive option? May 1994, when the meeting occurred, was just before we set off the USA '94.

Edit: Just remembering that the British associations met in 1993 to come to an agreement over internal eligibility to play for their teams: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIFA_e...1993_agreement

Maybe that sparked a thought-process somewhere within the IFA about the possible import of FIFA's eligibility rules?

This is what the minutes for that 1994 meeting of the Players' Status Committee stated:

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Originally Posted by FIFA

The Committee considered [the IFA]’s statement that almost any player can obtain a Republic of Ireland passport in order to secure eligibility to play for this country.

The Committee discussed this very serious matter at length and had to come to the unfortunate conclusion that FIFA cannot interfere with the decisions taken by any
country in the question of granting passports.

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That's outlined at paragraph 58 of Kearns: http://web.archive.org/web/201107210...ard%202071.pdf

I do think the IFA exaggerated it a bit. Any country can bestow citizenship upon anyone they wish, be it honourary or whatever, but for them to have given the impression that "almost any player" could just obtain Irish citizenship for the purpose of securing eligibility to play for the FAI was stretching it a bit. It's not as if the FAI were petitioning the Irish government to grant passports to Brazilians (like what later happened in Qatar).

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

I do think the IFA exaggerated it a bit. Any country can bestow citizenship upon anyone they wish, be it honourary or whatever, but for them to have given the impression that "almost any player" could just obtain Irish citizenship for the purpose of securing eligibility to play for the FAI was stretching it a bit. It's not as if the FAI were petitioning the Irish government to grant passports to Brazilians (like what later happened in Qatar).

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In all likelihood the IFA were referring to all players north and south, not every player in the universe.
Perhaps you do not credit the IFA with having one tiny morsel of common sense? :) (the failsafe assumption).
Then again, who can really tell what they were intending.

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Originally Posted by geysir

In all likelihood the IFA were referring to all players north and south, not every player in the universe.
Perhaps you do not credit the IFA with having one tiny morsel of common sense? :) (the failsafe assumption).
Then again, who can really tell what they were intending.

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I did realise the likelihood and considered it, but, as you say, you just couldn't know for sure!

Possibly the success of Ireland from 1988 onwards and our participation at the 94 World Cup, might have worried the IFA that players might consider us over them. Tommy Coyne's background and role in this WC might have also been a minor factor in their thinking.

What was Tommy Coyne's background? He's from Govan, but did he qualify through northern ancestry?

Didn't Jason McAteer qualify through northern roots as well? Was his grandfather from the Newry/Armagh/Down area or have I imagined that? Pretty sure I read that somewhere.

In other news, Eamon Donoghue of the Irish Times appears to think James McClean and Shane Duffy, two Irish nationals by virtue of their births in Ireland, are "foreign-born": http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/socc...land-1.2671633

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Originally Posted by Eamon Donoghue

Ireland have selected the second most amount of foreign-born players of any of the nations competing in the upcoming European Championships.

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Ireland’s eight players are Jonathan Walters, Ciaran Clark, Cyrus Christie and Richard Keogh - all born in England. Aiden McGeady and James McCarthy are both Scottish-born, while Shane Duffy and James McClean both qualify for the list as they were born in Northern Ireland.

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To say they "qualify for the list" of "foreign-born" players is just legally inaccurate, not to mention completely ignorant and insulting. Irish nationality law treats the island as a unit for the purpose of determining nationality. Irish nationals born in the north are not deemed foreign-born under Irish law; their status is the exact same as Irish nationals born anywhere else on the island. Their non-foreign status is further evidenced by the fact that the Foreign Births Register applies only to births external to the island; births in the north are not and cannot be included in the register.

His list isn't even correct otherwise anyway. He forgot about Manchester-born Westwood.

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

In other news, Eamon Donoghue of the Irish Times appears to think James McClean and Shane Duffy, two Irish nationals by virtue of their births in Ireland, are "foreign-born": http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/socc...land-1.2671633



To say they "qualify for the list" of "foreign-born" players is just legally inaccurate, not to mention completely ignorant and insulting. Irish nationality law treats the island as a unit for the purpose of determining nationality. Irish nationals born in the north are not deemed foreign-born under Irish law; their status is the exact same as Irish nationals born anywhere else on the island. Their non-foreign status is further evidenced by the fact that the Foreign Births Register applies only to births external to the island; births in the north are not and cannot be included in the register.

His list isn't even correct otherwise anyway. He forgot about Manchester-born Westwood.

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I wonder if he wrote it before the squad was selected, expecting Forde to make the cut, then forgot to change it.

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

What was Tommy Coyne's background? He's from Govan, but did he qualify through northern ancestry?

Didn't Jason McAteer qualify through northern roots as well? Was his grandfather from the Newry/Armagh/Down area or have I imagined that? Pretty sure I read that somewhere.

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I probably didn't explain myself properly. I was more thinking along the lines that while Houghton was Scottish born, he played in England, while Coyne was Scottish based, and this was possibly a wake up call to the IFA that this trend had the possibility to happen in their own backyard, as it had just across the ditch. Just on Coyne's background like many Scottish born Irish players, his ancestors seem to be from Donegal!

https://medium.com/@KCsixtyseven/don...c1c#.wzggcaopb

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

I wonder if he wrote it before the squad was selected, expecting Forde to make the cut, then forgot to change it.

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Ah, that is a possibility.

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Originally Posted by gastric

I probably didn't explain myself properly. I was more thinking along the lines that while Houghton was Scottish born, he played in England, while Coyne was Scottish based, and this was possibly a wake up call to the IFA that this trend had the possibility to happen in their own backyard, as it had just across the ditch. Just on Coyne's background like many Scottish born Irish players, his ancestors seem to be from Donegal!

https://medium.com/@KCsixtyseven/don...c1c#.wzggcaopb

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That's a great read. Cheers for that.

Then the IFA discomfort in april 1994 was in the context of the make up and success of the team that Jack had built over the previous 6 years, the escalating nature of our use of 1st and 2nd generation nationals and this generated a fear amongst the IFA that the nordie nationalist held in football bondage could be next, even though not one player in the IFA jurisdiction had declared for the FAI. As in, a fear that once one player gets the taste of freedom the floodgates will open, the shifty fenians will flee in droves.

I suppose it's best not to try and work out the rationale behind the statement they forwarded to the FiFA committee for consideration that 'almost any player can obtain a Republic of Ireland passport in order to secure eligibility to play for this country'.

But it was capped by an equally bizarre reply.
The Committee discussed this very serious matter at length and had to come to the unfortunate conclusion that FIFA cannot interfere with the decisions taken by any
country in the question of granting passports.

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Originally Posted by Danny Invincible

To say they "qualify for the list" of "foreign-born" players is just legally inaccurate, not to mention completely ignorant and insulting. Irish nationality law treats the island as a unit for the purpose of determining nationality

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Heh. Quality Mopery from the lad Invincible there. I'm guessing that Eamon Donoghue isn't a NI, Scotland or England fan taking the p*ss, although I suppose he could be a self-loathing Blueshirt Partitionist (other abuses available). The problem he's pointing out is that the FAI can only find 14 players good enough who've actually lived in the country. I mean, even the hapless IFA managed 18 in a tiny backwater of the next door country. Shame Wilson, Darkside Darron and EOK missed out, we could have claimed the full set.

PS doesn't the Law still avoid trivia?

More tedious, hypocritical nonsense.

This thread is not about point scoring, move on

If that was true, you'd have blocked most of the posters in it a long time ago.

The last word shouldn't be that effort at incitement by GR. Not on this forum anyway, I don't think. It is completely unfair to our own players to suggest that Shane Duffy and James McClean have not lived in Ireland.

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Originally Posted by Wolfman

If that was true, you'd have blocked most of the posters in it a long time ago.

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#forummodproblems

But I don't have a problem.

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Originally Posted by Gather round

Heh. Quality Mopery from the lad Invincible there. I'm guessing that Eamon Donoghue isn't a NI, Scotland or England fan taking the p*ss, although I suppose he could be a self-loathing Blueshirt Partitionist (other abuses available). The problem he's pointing out is that the FAI can only find 14 players good enough who've actually lived in the country. I mean, even the hapless IFA managed 18 in a tiny backwater of the next door country. Shame Wilson, Darkside Darron and EOK missed out, we could have claimed the full set.

PS doesn't the Law still avoid trivia?

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Where's the trivia?

If there's a point to be made about FAI infrastructural or developmental problems, it can be made without referring to players who were born in Ireland as "foreign-born". (I mean, McClean also played for Derry City in the League of Ireland; not IFA-affiliated.) It's not mopery on my part. It's simply a legally-inaccurate thing to say and a silly demeaning attitude that deserves criticism.

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Originally Posted by Gather round

For the benefit of other readers, the conversation tends to go like this (unlike the impression above that it was raised once or twice and duly forgotten):

Random RoI poster/ commentator/ sh*t-stirrer: Why don't we have a united Ireland football team?

Passing NI fan: It would mean by definition the end of the NI team. We aren't interested for the umpteenth time. Now go away and stop stirring

DI: Hang on. Why do you assume the NI team alone would disappear? The FAI's would have to go too

GR: Fine, you go ahead and dissolve your own team. Probably best to consult with your fans first though, maybe try knocking some doors in Darndale to sell the idea?

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It would obviously be a mutually-agreed thing that would necessarily involve compromise on both sides, if it were to happen and work, that is. That's the point I make really. When I make that point, I generally make it to our own fans, or to that "Random RoI poster/commentator/sh*t-stirrer", as you refer to him or her. I'm not lecturing NI fans nor am I imposing moral expectations on them; just encouraging some self-reflection on what we can do that might be conducive to realising a single united team (if that is indeed what we, or some of us, would desire). We can't really just expect NI fans to be happy with their team being subsumed by the FAI. For one, it'd be hypocritical of us because we hardly expect the same of ourselves (say, our team being subsumed by the IFA). That's the gist of it; to say I'm advocating the dissolution of the FAI, as if it's some active campaign I'm engaged in, gives a misleading impression. I'm just testing theoretical waters and engaging in dialogue. You have to start somewhere and can only learn by interacting with those you might wish to persuade.