Governance of the FAI

[Eirambler]

https://archive.ph/eSJMM

Courell seems to be about 90% corporate bluster, the kind of lad you'd see turning up on Bloomberg or CNBC talking in nonsensical jargon.

Reading between the lines it sounds like Cathal Dervan is maybe heading out the door.

[Eminence Grise]

Dervan wouldn’t be irreplaceable. There’s a world of difference between being a sports journalist and running a comms office. Comms management isn’t swanning round with the men’s senior team arranging press conferences and soft flannel interviews about games of two 'alves and club form. I’m sure he’s good at that, and well connected. But your top comms manager doesn’t do routine media work. They run the comms team and budgets. They're focussed on managing issues, crisis avoidance and message management for audiences who don’t read the sports pages – I’m generalising with the last bit, but the civil servants who do the budget sums for ministers, and the ministers themselves and the sports quangos the government funds like to hear news of competency now and again. Colin Healy’s contract, Eileen Gleeson’s salary without a job, the hunt for Stephen Kenny’s replacement, internal strife with unions and staff issues, handling the backwater blazers with fiefdoms in local leagues – the comms on all of those were bungled, and some still are. Teneo are very good at what they do, and they’ll offer high-level comms strategy and be on hand for big issues and crises, but they won’t be cheap or as timely as having an experienced comms manager in-house 24-7. If Dervan is on the way out and I was the FAI, I'd be whispering in the corridors in the likes of Teneo and Wilson Hartnell to see if any of their senior sports comms people have itchy feet (and quite possibly masochistic tendencies).

[Eirambler]

In recent years we've also had Callum Robinson allowing himself to be drawn into a debate on COVID vaccinations in the middle of the pandemic and more recently Evan Ferguson accidentally being directed into a press conference he wasn't supposed to be part of and answering questions by himself without any FAI PR in the room.

It's stuff that you hear of and think - you'd never see that happen at the clubs these lads play at. A lot of what they see on international break must seem very different to what they're used to with their clubs.

[Razors left peg]

https://archive.ph/eSJMM

Courell seems to be about 90% corporate bluster, the kind of lad you'd see turning up on Bloomberg or CNBC talking in nonsensical jargon.

Reading between the lines it sounds like Cathal Dervan is maybe heading out the door.

Dervan will be forever tainted by the "interview" he did with Canham bull$hitting his way around the manager search last year.

I agree on Courell, when he came into the scene talking about being "airgapped" it was obvious he loved a bit of corporate jargon.

[osarusan]

Dervan has always been a spoofer, as a journalist too.

[Fixer82]

Dervan has always been a spoofer, as a journalist too.

Anyone journalist that tells fans to boo a player wearing a green jersey, even if the player was in the wrong, is a sap!

[elatedscum]

Anyone journalist that tells fans to boo a player wearing a green jersey, even if the player was in the wrong, is a sap!

Who did he say to boo?

Re the Ferguson thing, that was the last camp so presumably when he was sent to be with the 21s.

Ah the FAI…

[Eirambler]

It was Roy Keane back in the late 90s wasn't it? And then he ghost wrote McCarthy's book after Saipan.

[Exgrad]

It was Roy Keane back in the late 90s wasn't it? And then he ghost wrote McCarthy's book after Saipan.

Yes but the book was before Saipan, about getting to the World Cup. So he chose a guy to ghost it for him who had been trying to turn fans against a key player on his team a couple of years before. Genius move by McCarthy.

[tetsujin1979]

Yes but the book was before Saipan, about getting to the World Cup. So he chose a guy to ghost it for him who had been trying to turn fans against a key player on his team a couple of years before. Genius move by McCarthy.

The World Cup Diary? Came out in October 2002, was given it for my birthday
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...Cup_Diary_2002

[Kingdom]

Dervan wouldn’t be irreplaceable. There’s a world of difference between being a sports journalist and running a comms office. Comms management isn’t swanning round with the men’s senior team arranging press conferences and soft flannel interviews about games of two 'alves and club form. I’m sure he’s good at that, and well connected. But your top comms manager doesn’t do routine media work. They run the comms team and budgets. They're focussed on managing issues, crisis avoidance and message management for audiences who don’t read the sports pages – I’m generalising with the last bit, but the civil servants who do the budget sums for ministers, and the ministers themselves and the sports quangos the government funds like to hear news of competency now and again. Colin Healy’s contract, Eileen Gleeson’s salary without a job, the hunt for Stephen Kenny’s replacement, internal strife with unions and staff issues, handling the backwater blazers with fiefdoms in local leagues – the comms on all of those were bungled, and some still are. Teneo are very good at what they do, and they’ll offer high-level comms strategy and be on hand for big issues and crises, but they won’t be cheap or as timely as having an experienced comms manager in-house 24-7. If Dervan is on the way out and I was the FAI, I'd be whispering in the corridors in the likes of Teneo and Wilson Hartnell to see if any of their senior sports comms people have itchy feet (and quite possibly masochistic tendencies).

This post is about as good, informed and relevant a post on the FAI as I've seen here in 20 years. Perfection.

[Eminence Grise]

Thank you, Kingdom. Means a lot.

[Buckett]

https://m.independent.ie/irish-news/...847719751.html

[EalingGreen]

Don't know whether this is the appropriate thread, but it appears the FAI is going to have fewer Guv'nors for a bit:

"FAI launches voluntary redundancy programme" - to be followed by compulsory redundancies:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football...s/cx2pk253k7ko

[cobhlad]

FAI faces explosive allegations in discrimination case by former women’s team boss Eileen Gleeson - https://www.independent.ie/irish-new...544087917.html

Not like the FAI to face a HR scandal…

[Diggs246]

How much does the FAI generate from the senior ladies team? And how much do they generate from the men's?

She not entitled to the same pay as HH

[Eirambler]

Person evidently lacks the ability to say no. Same person then sues an organisation over her inability to say no. Don't even get me started on the equal pay nonsense. Shocking behaviour from a failed manager looking for a payday in court that she's incapable of earning out in the real world.

[tetsujin1979]

The players are on equal pay. There's an arguement there that the managers should be too.

[seanfhear]

Womens football can pay their, players / managers, as much as they want so long as womens football generates enough money to do that ~ That is just economic reality !

[Eirambler]

The players are on equal pay. There's an arguement there that the managers should be too.

Two wrongs don't make a right in my view. Also it's different for the players, for whom this is a second income as they are contracted to their clubs, whereas the manager is full time. Apples and oranges.

The women's team doesn't bring in near as much income as the men's team, why should any of them be paid as much?

It was once said that the League of Ireland was the problem child of Irish football, these days it's the women's team. Hopeless on the pitch and a nightmare to deal with off it.