Eligibility Rules, Okay

[ArdeeBhoy]

Really? Why not...if they are willing?

[DannyInvincible]

we shouldnt fast track any body just to tie him to us

I wouldn't advocate the unconstrained fast-tracking of anyone and everyone who might be eligible (say, the likes of Daniel Crowley, for example) - so I agree in that sense - but if a willing someone is at or very near to the level of where they can make a committed contribution to the squad, I don't see the harm in getting them in the mix and nipping any potential media distraction over lingering dual eligibility in the bud. Grealish, Naughton and Kane are all playing at a level where they can add something.

Edit: I suppose, if they're ready, that's not really fast-tracking, is it?

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

So you're saying he's a mercenary? Well I never. What does TOWK think of this?

It would somewhat prove what I am saying, wouldn't it? Houghton and McGeady also declared for Ireland partly because of ineptitude on the part of the Scottish set up. Even some of our Northern lads have toed a similar line.

McGeady and McCarthy are more than good enough to play for Scotland so their situation is very different to some (all?) of our English declarees. Then there is the fact that there is nothing disingenuous about their attachment to this country. They did grow up with Irish family on both sides and strongly identify as Irish.

I would sympathise with Scottish fans who are/were angry about their defection, though there is no need for them to bring religion or sectarianism into it.

[ArdeeBhoy]

Clearly you don't know how a sizeable minority of Scottish unionists feel, or operate...

[Charlie Darwin]

Clearly you don't know how a sizeable minority of Scottish inionists feel, or operate...

Let me guess: you do know, and if we want to find out we'll have to google it?

[DannyInvincible]

It would somewhat prove what I am saying, wouldn't it? Houghton and McGeady also declared for Ireland partly because of ineptitude on the part of the Scottish set up. Even some of our Northern lads have toed a similar line.

What does it prove exactly? Any decision a dual national/citizenship professional international footballer takes will obviously be coloured by a multitude of factors; some factors more so than others and possibly including things like national identity, benefit to career long-term and who has treated him well or given him opportunities. For every James McClean or Shane Duffy there's a Paddy McCourt or a Niall McGinn. You seem to live in a purist world of cartoonish polar extremes where such players are either unscrupulous mercenaries or potential patron-saint-of-Ireland material. Even if the SFA's ineptitude contributed to the decisions of Houghton and McGeady in declaring for us, it's not as if they hadn't simultaneous deep-rooted attachments to Ireland. SFA ineptitude doesn't contaminate their decision to declare.

As for the northern lads, they've pretty much universally expressed that their dream was to play for Ireland. If the IFA ever cocked up, as they seemingly did in the case of Darron Gibson, it only made any decision to declare for us easier.

McGeady and McCarthy are more than good enough to play for Scotland so their situation is very different to some (all?) of our English declarees. Then there is the fact that there is nothing disingenuous about their attachment to this country. They did grow up with Irish family on both sides and strongly identify as Irish.

Whose attachment is disingenuous? It seems you'll always make the unfair and groundless assumption that (all?) our England-born declarers are simply choosing us as back-up because competition is sterner with England or because they'll never be good enough to play for them. Even when guys like Grealish have been playing for us from the age of 14, you'll doubt their motivations. How do they win with you?

I would sympathise with Scottish fans who are/were angry about their defection, though there is no need for them to bring religion or sectarianism into it.

Who defected? McGeady and McCarthy have always been FAI players. Why the sympathy exactly?

[ArdeeBhoy]

Let me guess: you do know, and if we want to find out we'll have to google it?

Well, it is pretty universal knowledge. Google, not required !
If you don't know by now, we'll award you the appropriate trophy in your own name...

[DannyInvincible]

Burnley's Marvin Sordell is not only eligible for us, but is also plenty experienced at international level... That is according to the rather confused Alan Parry: http://balls.ie/football/knew-burnle...international/

Irish sports fans are forever giving out about English sports commentators propensity for calling Irish sports stars English (not to mention English sports fans tendency to wonder aloud as to why Irish strikers aren’t being called up to the England squad).

Well, tonight we had the opposite problem.

Experienced commentator Alan Parry introduced Marvin Sordell to the Sky audience as an ‘experienced Republic of Ireland international’ who Sean Dyche knew from their days playing together with Millwall. Sordell, evidently a precocious talent, was 12 when Dyche was at Millwall.

Of course, there is a possibility that Parry got mixed up between Sordell and current Burnley player, ex-Irish international and former playing colleague of Sean Dyche at Millwall, Steven Reid.

An Andre Mariner mistake if ever there was one.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

Harry Kane aiming for I̶r̶e̶l̶a̶n̶d̶ England call up.

​http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/foo...Tottenham.html

[DannyInvincible]

Where was Paul Rowan getting his info from the other day?

[Charlie Darwin]

Probably Kane's agent. We've seen before when a player is rumoured to be considering declaring for Ireland that suddenly the newspaper articles appear with him expressing his hope of playing for England.

[Stuttgart88]

Ed Joyce in TOWK wind up attempt

http://www.thescore.ie/ed-joyce-inte...44688-Aug2014/

I have to say it'd wind me up to, and I was just having fun with my first line. "I'd have preferred to have played for Ireland but England was better for my career" is one thing from the kid of an Irish grandfather, but not from a 35 year old Dubliner. In fairness, what he probably meant was that England offered him Test cricket and top level ODI exposure, and cricket is pretty unique in this regard. I think rugby is in danger of following suit, with countries like Ireland and NZ able to "buy" pacific islanders via the 3 year residency rule.

[ArdeeBhoy]

Well, the residency rule when it's fully exploited in soccer, will 'kill' smaller countries inc.Ireland.

Yet more evidence of FIFA/UEFA being idiots.

[Stuttgart88]

How fully exploited do you envisage the residency rule to become? I feel it'll still be exceptional / marginal.

[DannyInvincible]

I know you keep saying that AB, but I'm not convinced either. The "residency rule" is nothing new. Why isn't it being "fully exploited" now if the supposed conditions for its exploitation have long been there? It has been in place for years, but I'm not aware of even one example of an Irish player refusing to play for us and then declaring for another country after five years of residence there and upon acquiring citizenship of that country. For it to pose a problem for us, an Ireland-born player would have to repeatedly reject Irish call-ups for years after the age of 18 whilst living in another country and then later declare for that country. How might someone exploit it at our expense? I just don't see how it would threaten our player pool really. What talented Irish player is going to decide to repeatedly reject selection and forego all international football, from youth level to senior, for at least five years post the age of 18 with the specific intention of declaring for another country after five years of residing there? I just can't envisage that happening.

[ArdeeBhoy]

I hear you gents and you're probably right, just have a very bad (substantial!) gut feeling about it all.

[DannyInvincible]

I hear you gents and you're probably right, just have a very bad (substantial!) gut feeling about it all.

I wouldn't fret about it, to be honest. Who do you fear is going to benefit from it at our expense? Most Irish players who play outside of Ireland play in the UK, but, by virtue of the special status of the four British associations, the four uniquely require that any player who might qualify to play for one of them through residency must have completed five years of education in the territory of the association for whom he wishes to play before reaching the age of 18. Even if the British associations were to collectively rid themselves of that agreed stipulation (they'd be entitled to do so by virtue of FIFA's regulations as "associations sharing a common nationality") and, instead, were to decide to adhere to the general residency principle, it shouldn't make any real difference as far as we'd be concerned.

If you imagine how a young footballer might think or if you consider the combination of factors that would be required for such a player to have the opportunity of playing for an adopted country through residency at the age of 23 or later, there's just no credible reason to fear the death or injury of smaller associations by virtue of what is already a longstanding clause. If a player wants to play international football and is eligible for only one country - the one in which he was born - he'll usually accept a call-up by his country at the first opportunity. He'll surely jump at the chance; it's the only option he'll have.

There's no way any player who wants to play international football will continuously reject repeated call-up attempts by his native association and, instead, decide that he's going to try and realise his dream of playing international football by playing for some other country in which he hasn't yet resided, of which he does not yet possess citizenship or in which he has only been residing for a short period of time via relying on spending five continuous years living/playing there and developing his ability to a level where, by the age of 23 (at the earliest), he will be considered talented enough to challenge for a place in his adopted country's senior international team. It would be to rely on the coming together of too many unlikely and unpredictable circumstances.

The reason why there was (misguided) talk of Adnan Januzaj potentially becoming eligible to play for England, for example, was because he'd not played international football for any team as a result of his rather rare situation; it seems he might have been holding out for Kosovan recognition for a period. Even if it had been possible for him to have become eligible for England at some point, the chances of him actually opting to play for them down the line would have been extremely remote considering he had invites coming in from other associations for whom he was actually eligible. As it happened, he accepted a call-up by Belgium.

Even if a player was a pure mercenary whose desire to play international football was driven only by careerism rather than by any sense of national pride, it would be just too uncertain and risky a career plan for him to, in pursuance of his goal, try and rely on the aforementioned scenario being realised. If a player is going to be good enough to play at international level, his native association will almost always have secured his services by the time he's turned 23 or before he could have become eligible for the other country in which he is resident anyway.

The residency clause benefits those players in whom a native association have never had an interest. It gives such "surplus" players a second option after a period of five years (at the very least) of non-interest in them post the age of 18 by their native association. When these players might acquire a new nationality, they'll be eligible to play for the association of their adopted country primarily because their native association will never have had any serious interest in them in the first place. So, there's no reason to worry that the clause will kill off smaller associations. Is there even one example in world football of a minor association losing out to a bigger power by virtue of the residency clause? I can't think of any.

I know Diego Costa switched to Spain with the aid of the residency clause after having played in two senior friendlies for Brazil, but Brazil are a major association with such an array of firepower that even a player of Diego Costa's ability had received no international recognition from them until after his 23rd birthday.

[ArdeeBhoy]

Bloody hell, Danny!


Fair enough!

[DannyInvincible]

Ha, I was trying to imagine scenarios in which it might pose a problem and how it actually plays out in practice, so that was as much musing as anything else, but I'm pretty sure I've covered all possibilities.

[DannyInvincible]

No if your have 2 Irish grandparents then you have 50% Irish blood so you either have and one english and one Irish parent or you have 2 parents who are 50% Irish.
I suspect he has one parent of each nationality, that is the way I look at it anyway, blood if thicker than water.

But both of Noble's parents were born in England. Anyway, I don't think it's something that can be simply quantified by a mathematical formula like that. I mean, how would you quantify Noe Baba's Irishness using the same simplistic methodology as you outline above? Irishness is a feeling (that can, of course, be legally certified; meaning you're either an Irish national or you're not); it isn't something that can be quantified as a specific number, fraction or percentile.

England have been a flop for 50 years, under achievers for 50 years, the evidence is staring you in the face, ie Mark Nobel, were he 100% English
I have little doubt he would have been capped by now. Exhibit #2 is Kevin Nolan, the Nolan sisters made him unselectable for England. I rest my case!!!

But that's not evidence of anything. It's just conjecture. Or conspiracy theory, even. More likely, Mark Noble has been overlooked for the English senior team because he has never been deemed good enough by whatever managers they've had in charge. The same applies to Kevin Nolan. If the FA had a problem with Noble's "diluted" English identity, why would he have been allowed to captain their under-21 side? As I've demonstrated, they've had absolutely no problem with regularly selecting players of mixed heritage.

Well, yeah. The link he was drawing was that if an Irish player is half-arsed then they're a waste of time. Same principle applies for a half-arsed English-born player playing for Ireland. On the other hand, a fully-committed, English-born player would be, in Sadlier's view, worth pursuing and in spite of the comments that Noble has made of late.

What puzzled me was that Noble isn't fully committed, yet Sadlier is all for his inclusion.