QuoteI wasn't questioning you by the way, more curious if it was something Kerr might have said after the event. I always found it a bit odd that Delap's secret weapon stayed exactly that for so long, to my mind at least.
Maybe it wasn't Kerr
I wasn't questioning you by the way, more curious if it was something Kerr might have said after the event. I always found it a bit odd that Delap's secret weapon stayed exactly that for so long, to my mind at least.
I came across this piece about Matthew Shiels in a copy of the Leader (a local Donegal paper) sitting in a pile of old papers. It features some info in the lad's Irish roots and his local connections (although the author is getting his FIFA articles mixed up when he talks of article 18 being the "granny rule").
Apologies for the poor image quality.
'twas Trapp.Originally Posted by Stuttgart88
Remember when Rangers players used to get booed in Lansdowne Road. Never taught anything of it at the time, but now it seems ridiculous.
Matthew Shiels lined out for Scotland's under-19s the other day, two weeks after lining out for our under-19s: https://www.thesun.ie/sport/football...ic-of-ireland/
Both games were non-competitive.
Is he a double Agent.....But for Whom /Who ?
Patrick Bamford scored a his first hat-trick tonight, making it six goals in his last three games... would it look really bad if we made an approach now?
No he's just a dirty floozy trying to tease us!
We’d have to get someone that doesn’t mind feeling dirty . He knows he is qualified . If he wants to all he has to do is let the right people know he is interested . One has to have some self respect .
In any case, we have never convinced any former England U21 player to play for us so it seems it's a no no in any case.
"We lost because we didn't win"- Ronaldo
It's a tricky one. He never ruled us out. But a few barren years and now very average championship scoring record and we are talking about him claiming. Is that making him think about claiming? At the moment it appears to me like his stock would have to fall another bit for him to claim for us. Hard to know how I would feel about it. His England dream is quite remote now so why hasn't he claimed. How much more remote must it get?
Paddy McEleney scored on his Oldham debut today away to Scunthorpe. Oldham won 2-0 with Eoin Doyle scoring the second.
This is an odd one - Son of Pierce, and nephew of David O'Leary - Ryan (O'Leary) Pierce formerly of Aberdeen and Kilmarknock is now starring in a Canadian Soccer Drama called 21 Thunder. If he ever wins an Oscar can we claim him like the Brits claim all of our actors?!!
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm8507926/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt6145878/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_1
You show me a good loser and I'll show you a loser - Vince Lombardi
Arsehole talk
https://www.msn.com/en-ie/sport/foot...BJQyR5?ocid=st
unbelievable nonsense as usual from o Neill. Martin o Neill needs to come out and say he has no intention of contemplating any such gentleman's agreement. Brian Kerr's attitude to this always annoyed the life out of me this pandering to the northern quasi football state. If I'm born in cork or in antrim I'm Irish and if I want to play for Ireland I can end of story.
Michael o Neill would be spending this weekend trying to get mctomminey to play for Scotland if the Scots had come up with enough cash and a long-term contract for him after he interviewed for that job before Christmas so he is not exactly Mr loyal. Turning it into a Catholic protestant argument is pathetic anyone who wants to represent their country of Ireland has always been welcome.
He says Rory Hale hasn't got picked for us yet he is in our 21 s squads and the Rory brown lad only switched a few months ago and has been in our 18/19s squads so that is more tripe.
The last time a few months ago he went off on one of these rants he thought aoron mceneff had switched when only his brother actually had which would hardly fill you with confidence. Noel king takes slot of flak but I hope he continues to work to fascilite lads to come across from the north to play for their country
Easy solution. Start targeting every NI born player from the age of 15 0nwards. I can imagine some of the more colourful answers the FAI might receive from some parties, but let's not be perceived to be racist!
I thought the IFA had moved on from this embarrassing nonsense.
What is O'Neill's evidence for all this? How does he know these Catholic players didn't initiate contact with the FAI? How does he know the FAI were supposedly interested in McNair if the FAI "stayed away from it"? That would imply the association didn't approach him.
This notion of a sectarian selection policy is such baloney seeing as players from all sorts of religious backgrounds have played for us, including players from Ulster Protestant backgrounds such as Alan Kernaghan, Alex Bruce and Adam Barton.
O'Kane is a humanist.The five players born in the North capped for the Republic of Ireland at senior level by Martin O’Neill are all Catholic: James McClean, Shane Duffy, Darron Gibson, Marc Wilson and Eunan O’Kane.
Anyway, it's hardly a surprise most of our players from the north also come from Catholic backgrounds seeing as it is generally people from Catholic backgrounds who identify as nationally Irish. You might have the likes of Stephen Nolan "swinging both ways", but the number of Protestants in the north who support Ireland over NI would be rather small.
That's a misrepresentation of the rule. There is no FIFA rule specifically tailored to favour the FAI. The rule in question - article 5 of the Regulations Governing the Application of the Statutes - is not contentious and features the general eligibility principle. It says that "[a]ny person holding a permanent nationality that is not dependent on residence in a certain country is eligible to play for the representative teams of the Association of that country". Only Irish nationals can play for Ireland. If a player is a British citizen only, he is not eligible to play for the FAI.While there is speculation another Catholic, QPR striker Paul Smyth, a Belfast-born GAA fan, may be tempted to switch ranks under the contentious FIFA rule which allows a player born anywhere on the island to declare for the Republic.
Is he conflating media speculation with a supposed FAI policy? Have the FAI assumed Smyth wants to play for Ireland? How would O'Neill know this? Simply on the basis of a speculative newspaper article?‘You can’t assume just because a player from the North watches GAA that he wants to play for the Republic of Ireland. I liked the GAA, so did Jim Magilton, and Martin O’Neill,’ said O’Neill. ‘There was a recent article about Paul Smyth, which could easily have been written a few years ago about Stuart Dallas, when he was breaking into Brentford team.
‘But Stuart wasn’t mentioned. Why? Because he’s Protestant. That’s what annoys us the most.
Everything the FAI do stays within the confines of the same set of eligibility rules (articles 5-8) by which every other association has to play, so it's hardly unscrupulous. And it doesn't matter where else players might have a "direct bloodline" to; if they're Irish nationals and satisfy the eligibility criteria, they're eligible to play for us.O’Neill questioned the FAI’s ‘unscrupulous’ means of sourcing players with a direct bloodline to Northern Ireland.
He seems to think the FAI require the IFA's permission to facilitate Irish nationals who wish to play for their country. What planet is he on?‘There is no consultation, the Republic just go and weasel away and take the player,’ he said.
Those players aren't zombies or unconscious automatons. They would have made a decision, most likely with the assistance of their families and friends, and would have weighed up the benefits and the risks. The FAI would have then facilitated their choice. Maybe these players are happier to be simply fighting for a chance to represent their country than they would be racking up caps for an entity with which they don't identify.‘Daniel Devine of Partick Thistle is a West Belfast boy and would have gone to Euros (2016) with us. Only he can’t play for Northern Ireland as he’s signed an international transfer.’
‘They (FAI) don’t really care about the player, just care about taking him.
‘They’ve taken Northern Ireland players and not played them, Daniel was one, Rory Hale another. Rory Brown, a goalkeeper is the most recent.
‘I can list you 10 players who’ve made that decision and have never represented the Republic.
‘Why take them? What is point of asking a player to change his allegiance, to make a decision about his whole international future, and then not pick him?’
Also, as liamoo points out, Hale has been in under-21 squads of ours.
The complaint used to be that the players who switched were hanging around in the IFA's youth teams for too long and weren't switching early enough. Now, they're supposedly switching too early. Which is it?‘I don’t have a problem with James McClean. He was 22 years of age, he knew what he wanted. I have a problem when it’s a 16, 17 or 18-year-old.’
He's deluded. I hope Martin tells him to get lost. Any gentleman's agreement whereby the FAI would refuse to facilitate northerners who wish to make themselves available for Ireland would be a breach of FIFA's rules and of individual players' rights under those rules. John Delaney has in the past claimed that the FAI don't approach northern players (and I know this was the case with Shane Duffy), but why shouldn't the FAI approach eligible players? The association would be entirely within their rights to do so, if they wanted.To help prevent further seepage from Northern Ireland ranks, O’Neill will seek a ceasefire with his Republic of Ireland counterpart, a former captain of the North.
‘I hope to sit down with Martin and get some sort of gentleman’s agreement whereby if a young boy has represented Northern Ireland at aged 17 to 21, the FAI don’t ask him to change,’ said O’Neill.
That's just not true. For the FAI to "get him", the player would first have to be an Irish national and would also have to want to play for the FAI, obviously. The FAI can't force northern players who don't identify as Irish nationals to play for us.If a young Northern Ireland player explodes on the scene and ‘turns out to be a superstar’, O’Neill points out that ‘the FAI can get him before I cap him, they just have to stay on top of it.’
Last edited by DannyInvincible; 05/03/2018 at 11:12 PM.
Thanks Dan. Good breakdown.
His comments make me feel sick. For a guy who seems to have much goodwill amongst broader media down here for his punditry on TV3 and time at Rovers, he is well able to spout some bile when he wants to.
The sectarianism point is completely ridiculous, as Dan states. The intrinsic link between Catholicism and Nationalism is obviously the foundation for us pursuing a player, not where he goes to mass on a Sunday (if at all).
Still a bit of time there for Daniel Devine to push on but I'm afraid we have a few options in the SPL at the back as well as him- Carl McHugh, Anthony O'Connor, Joe Shaughnessy (all 4 are 25, co-incidentally).
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