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Yeah, looks like it's him. The google cached version is still available: https://webcache.googleusercontent.c...&ct=clnk&gl=ieQuote:
Originally Posted by DannyInvincible
Clicking the "Philip Quinn" link at the top brings you to this page: https://extra.ie/author/philip-quinn
Back out in the open. Tomorrow's Irish Mail.
Attachment 2655
Same journalist
Not sure when the article was published on extra.ie but I know Mr. Parker put the link up here on Sunday night. Is it slightly odd there was a lag on Monday in publishing the article in the Mail? That's very dependent on when the article was published Sunday.
I'd agree to a certain extent. After a certain length of time, the lack of a flat-out denial is telling. That said, the fact that the article has just been pulled without explanation or comment doesn't fill me with confidence in the journalist either. Why would they not stand over their own story, if it is 100% accurate?Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr_Parker
I think the power of the IFA to just make this go away is being overstated - these comments, if true, are a serious story, and I can't imagine an organisation like the BBC simply going along with the IFA on this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by osarusan
Well now that it has been published again I think we can all be fairly confident of its accuracy. Sports journalists are so be holding to the IFA and O'neill is unreal in the North. A journalist knows that if he falls foul of either, much of his job will be impossible due to losing access. It would not surprise me that they were asked to sit on it. Even today there still isn't a peep out of them that I have seen.
Michael O Neill is driving a precarious route on this one . Perhaps the Guardians of Sensibility might have a word with him to keep a straight and sensible line . Less chance of drawing attention to his manoeuvring .
It's lead story on RTESports this morning.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr_Parker
RTÉ & the Irish Independent are both reporting it. Neither mention the sectarian accusation a such, so it reads slightly softer maybe.
From the RTE article:
Perhaps Extra.ie were told to delete it as it was an Irish Daily Mail story. (No idea who the journalist Philip Quinn is, may be a freelancer)Quote:
Speaking to the Irish Daily Mail, Michael O’Neill said the number of players that have opted to play for the Republic and not made a senior appearance is in double figures.
We should start targeting Prod players as well, just to see the head on him
That's actually how I would like our MON / Association respond to this, if they chose to acknowledge it at all. Make clear all Irishmen are entitled to and very welcome to represent Ireland and will all be welcomed by everyone in Mexico, should they chose to do so. Don't take a backward step here.Quote:
Originally Posted by Diggs246
Don't think there's much chance of MON addressing it. From my memory, he seems to be keeping well back from this topic. I would love us to have a manager that would take a more responsive approach to these assertions coming from Michael O'Neill (not the first time either). Trap probably wasn't aware of the topic. Kerr has always been soft on it and Staunton wasn't around long enough or exposed to it.Quote:
Originally Posted by CraftyToePoke
Wouldn't be too hard to open him up with a well phrased question at a press conference, with Duffy sitting next to him, or young James.Quote:
Originally Posted by Olé Olé
This is from the RTE article, which is not the case.
Quote:
Players born on the island of Ireland have the right to represent either the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland and can switch, as long as they have not already played in an official competition at senior international level for either country
Quinn is well-known and has been around a good while. I've seen him interviewed for documentaries/features on Irish football before. I'm not sure when this one below would have been made exactly, but he features in it discussing the Ireland-Italy game from World Cup '94 at 1m33s:Quote:
Originally Posted by osarusan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cm84...utu.be&t=1m33s
Has anyone seen the full text of the Irish Daily Mail interview? I wonder does it feature the more explicit accusations of "sectarian"/"unscrupulous" recruitment and "weasel[ing] away"...?
SMH. Was it all in vain?!Quote:
Originally Posted by IsMiseSean
https://media.giphy.com/media/g8GfH3i5F0hby/giphy.gif
Extra.ie and the IDM are the same thing. I presume they pulled it because they knew it would sell papers if it was taken offline.Quote:
Originally Posted by osarusan
Tony O'Donoghue steps up: "This one is for James. James, you were born within the 6 counties and are passionate about representing Ireland as it is your country. Can you understand how others from the 6 counties have played or play for Northern Ireland despite coming from, what from the outside look like, nationalist backgrounds? That must be very hard for you to reconcile, James, is it?"Quote:
Originally Posted by CraftyToePoke
Here's something I'd written after the article had been removed from the web and before the interview was published again today, although I primarily sought to challenge much of what O'Neill said because, even if his words hadn't been true, the quotes were still representative of popular sentiment within the NI fan-base: https://danieldcollins.wordpress.com...itment-policy/
It is particularly hypocritical of O'Neill to scold the FAI for allegedly asking players to switch and then not picking them considering he himself was, according to Shane McEleney, "torturing" the player about switching from the FAI to the IFA, yet O'Neill has completely ignored the player at senior level since.
Here is the full content from the Irish Daily Mail:
https://image.ibb.co/jzOQXn/capture.png
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DXnND4ZX4AEArmp.jpg
The mini-piece that runs from the back page to page 48 is a watered-down version of the more explicit and accusatory content that was published on Sunday and pulled the following day.
In the longer piece, O'Neill rationalises his chase of Sean Scannell and attempts to distinguish this from the FAI recruiting northern players on the basis that Scannell's bloodline is from the north. In O'Neill's opinion, this means that "[the IFA are] not taking [Scannell] off the Republic" - O'Neill places his pursuit of Paddy McEleney in the same bracket - whilst a player switching from the IFA to the FAI is, in O'Neill's implied opinion, being taken from the IFA by the FAI. You can he sure that O'Neill is employing here the meaning of the word "take" that refers to the act of snatching something that isn't rightfully yours.
Thus, when the IFA facilitate a former FAI player moving in their (the IFA's) direction, O'Neill appears to be suggesting that the process is somehow purer, more correct or kosher - that it is simply the case of a player returning to his rightful home - but when a northern player moves in the opposite direction, this process is somehow tainted or sullied by the fact that that player may not have a bloodline to the 26 counties.
O'Neill is very much losing his bearings here by trying to apply to reality his own biased and prejudicial preconception (as to what he feels should really render a player eligible to play for an association) rather than trying to look at the rules and the practical nature of Irish nationality law in a rational and objective fashion.
Scannell's father is indeed from Armagh, but what has a bloodline to a territory got to do with anything? It doesn't make a player any more or less eligible for one particular association as long as that player satisfies the relevant eligibility criteria for another association, nor does it give the IFA some sort of exclusive right or preferential access to a player. Insofar as Scannell was eligible to play for the FAI, it doesn't matter how he was eligible, and insofar as he played for the FAI, his potential switch to the IFA is no different to a player who played for the IFA switching in the other direction.
As it happens, Scannell, as the son of an Irish national born on the island of Ireland is an Irish national as of birthright. Paddy McEleney is also an Irish national as of birthright, having been born in Derry. Nationality as of birthright is as close a connection you can get to a particular country in citizenship law internationally. There is no closer connection. In attempting to imply that the IFA should have more of a claim than the FAI over the likes of Scannell or that the likes of McEleney is rightfully theirs comes dangerously close to denying or diminishing the validity of the Irish nationality of Irish nationals born in the north. It's exceptionally poor form from O'Neill.
(I was sent the first photo by Del, by the way, just to give him credit for it.)
To be a fly on the wall when Michael meets Martin. 'Ever hear of the Good Friday Agreement Michael you dick?' End of.
O'Neill has never expressed an opinion on the switching point though. Is Eunan O'Kane the last player to have switched and obtained a senior cap? I think so. He switched around 2012. There hasn't been much precedence or reason to ask Martin about the topic during his tenure. There have been lads switching at underage level but I'm not sure if he's been asked about those or addressed them. There has been no direct impact on his squad anyway. It's actually hard to know how he feels about it. I think this is the most revealing he has ever been on his identity and even here he avoids the fact that he had a choice on who to represent and his views on same: Martin O'Neill on what it means to be Irish http://the42.ie/1089500Quote:
Originally Posted by gastric
For some reason, I get the impression it's an issue that Martin would rather avoid if at all possible on account of his history with the IFA. He was once NI's captain, of course, and I'm sure he doesn't want to upset old friends. They're a sensitive bunch when they're reminded they can't always get their way any more.
Agreed. That's exactly how it appears to me. In fact, no journalist has posed any question to him on the point. Could there be a gentleman's agreement with the media not to broach that one?
The bloodline argument seems fairly empty alright. He may feel like it is valid to apply it as some kind of principle in Scannell's particular case, but NI have had no problem in the past casting their net at players with no such link to NI, so there's no consistency.
I'd say my views on the 'taking their players' issue are fairly well known on this site, so I won't go into them again, but as somebody who has expressed sympathy for their situation in the past, comments like this from O'Neill, and other things the IFA do, seriously erode that sympathy.
Lots of ill informed stuff on radio Ulster this morning. People who should now better saying that the poor wains get their heads turned early on and once declared for Ireland may never be called up to play and that once this happens it's totally irreversible which I thought happens only after they got a senior competitive cap under their belts. Presenters are not challenging any of this, I'll see if I can post a link.
Commentators also seem to think that O'Neill's use of religion is part of some fiendishly clever strategy, I think it's more likely that he had a few before the interview.
The bit we're interested in starts a bit after 9.30
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09tgm9k
No, a player can only transfer allegiance once. eg. Jack Grealish is no long eligible for the rep of IrelandQuote:
Originally Posted by punkrocket
Those two lads were fair enough I thought. Starts at 35:40 by the way and runs for around fifteen minutes.Quote:
Originally Posted by punkrocket
IFA distancing themselves from the comments somewhat - https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/...ty-467959.html
The specific segment featuring discussion on O'Neill's comments can also be found here isolated from the rest of the show: https://audioboom.com/posts/6710539-...eacom5-discussQuote:
Originally Posted by punkrocket
Highlights:
i) Their weird pronunciation of Sean Scannell's surname. "Scan-ELLE"? That's surely not how it's pronounced, is it? He's not French, like. It reminds me of Richard "Sadlee-ay".
ii) Presenter: "So, Sean Scannell... He's English?"
Steve Beacom: "Yes, he's injured at the minute."
The talk of this 'gentleman's agreement' is utter nonsense. I hope the FAI aren't going to be agreeing to something like that.
Also, is there a similar situation like this anywhere else in the world?
Muzzy Izzet and Colin Kazim-Richards were eligible to play for Turkey on the basis of their Cypriot heritage because Turkish citizenship law extends extra-territorially over what only Turkey, out of the entire international community, recognises as Northern Cyprus, even though FIFA simultaneously recognises the entire island of Cyprus as the 'de jure' territory of the Cypriot football association. The eligibility of Northern or Turkish Cypriots to play for Turkey is probably the closest thing to an analogy that I've been able to find.Quote:
Originally Posted by IsMiseSean
A key difference in our case though is that the island-wide effect of Irish nationality law is multilaterally-agreed (since the GFA) and is, as a result, no longer a matter of diplomatic contention or dispute. It is all agreed, entirely above board and should not be a contentious matter.
Okay, I thought that the Alex Bruce saga was available to be copied.Quote:
Originally Posted by Diggs246
Where is Mackey getting this?:Quote:
Originally Posted by DeLorean
:excruciating:Quote:
Originally Posted by Liam Mackey
Just on Paddy McEleney as well, as Michael O'Neill mentioned him in the article, and this whole notion of players being "taken" when they go from IFA to FAI but this not being the case when they move from FAI to IFA... O'Neill had no qualms about meeting up with McEleney at a time when Noel King still had immediate plans for the player. In fact, McEleney provisionally agreed with O'Neill to switch from the FAI to the IFA and even had King ringing him up pleading with him not to go.
It eventually transpired that McEleney wasn't prepared to go through with the switch because he was told by an IFA official that he would have to apply for a British passport (or so he claimed anyway), which he didn't want to do, but O'Neill was nevertheless more than ready to open his arms to a player who was in immediate demand by another association.
Of course, O'Neill suggests this is different to the FAI facilitating players who might be in demand by the IFA because McEleney has a "bloodline"... :confused: The purported distinction is simply self-serving fantasy.
The thing is though, that nobody is prepared to actually take note of the facts or the counter-examples. Michael O’Neill has put this out there, the headlines and the claims have been made and 99% of people with any awareness of the situation will simply think the FAI is poaching players under some kind of loophole and poor old IFA is being hard done by.
Someone needs to explain to the IFA that , that "loophole" is called the Good Friday agreementQuote:
Originally Posted by Stuttgart88
RTE twitter account reporting from the press conference
MON: I have no problem to have a conversation with Michael O'Neill. Met him at a game recently. Very convivial conversation. Didn't mention this. Wish he had...
MON: I have not taken one senior player from him (Michael O'Neill). Bringing religion into it...you'll have to ask Michael. Very disappointing. It's the player's choice.