Centrally Contracted LOI Players

[A face]

The fact that international players earn millions of euro per year and live existences akin to celebrities means that we won't relate to them whether they played a season or two for Cork City or came through the Charlton academy.

You could hardly use that argument to describe Kevin Doyle?

I identify no more with Kevin Doyle than I do with Glenn Whelan or John O'Shea.

I identify with Doyler and i most definitely am not on my own. And i identify more with Richard Dunne as well after he said he'd like to play with Shamrock Rovers some day.

[brianw82]

I identify no more with Kevin Doyle than I do with Glenn Whelan or John O'Shea.

Just because a player plays LoI makes him no more or less entitled to play for the national team than a player who spends their career in Britain. All of the tyeam getting a grounding in the LoI would not make them any better or worse, you make some valid points about central contracts etc but the one about players being more identifiable to regular Irish people due to having played some LoI football is a closeted viewpoint imo.

What I really mean is that we won't be able to stop players leaving for bigger clubs in (most likely) Britain. However, the best players also leave Holland, Portugal, Denmark, Croatia and so on, but their players all begin their careers in their own countries (unless Liverpool or Arsenal kidnap them first) Does that not entice people to go to games, knowing they could well be looking at future internationals?

[A face]

What I really mean is that we won't be able to stop players leaving for bigger clubs in (most likely) Britain. However, the best players also leave Holland, Portugal, Denmark, Croatia and so on, but their players all begin their careers in their own countries (unless Liverpool or Arsenal kidnap them first) Does that not entice people to go to games, knowing they could well be looking at future internationals?

There is no argument, of course it helps to identify with them if the players have played at a LOI club first.