So what do you want to happen next?

**Stuttgart88** · 15/09/2013, 4:17 PM

I thought Eamon Sweeney was excellent in today's Sindo

http://www.independent.ie/sport/socc...-29580362.html

Thoughts?

**ArdeeBhoy** · 15/09/2013, 4:42 PM

Don't tell the Indo-haters on here

, as per the other threads.

With respect to ES, has he sad anything original? As in this has already been said here on this MB and elsewhere.
Plus no mention of the 'cyclical factor', which even affects much bigger countries....

**Charlie Darwin** · 15/09/2013, 5:05 PM

Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

I thought Eamon Sweeney was excellent in today's Sindo

http://www.independent.ie/sport/socc...-29580362.html

Thoughts?

Is it actually excellent? It's hardly anything that hasn't been said in every English paper for the past few years, but the "our players are good enough, if only they'd get the opportunities" argument doesn't wash. The Premier League is full of English players and few of them are within a hoop of making the national team, and that's generally the standard most of the Irish players are at. They're not there because they're not getting experience, they're there because that's their level. The Premier League is far better than it was 10 and 20 years ago, which means it's harder for talented players to make a mark, but that shouldn't mask the deficiencies of our own products.

Even his examples are fairly weak. He holds up Belgium as the counterpoint, yet that's the perfect example of a league that has to compete with two large leagues to each side of it and still manages to give its players a good standard of football from which they can make the leap to more established clubs in better leagues. Belgium's only twice the size of Ireland and their attendances aren't amazing, so it's not like something similar couldn't be replicated here, even if meant we became a feeder league for the Championship rather than the Premier League. The idea that there's no coaching issue is pure fingers-in-the-ears stuff.

**Stuttgart88** · 15/09/2013, 6:32 PM

I think it is a great piece because it spells out in simple terms why the argument that "we used to have players in the old top 5 all the time but now we don't means Irish football is now crap" is a load of bunk. The article isnt aimed at the likes of you and me, it's aimed at the casually interested Irish sports fan and it sets out the situation in clear and concise terms. You'd be amazed at how many of my friends have never thought of it this way.

I think Belgium is a good example. All he's saying is Belgian football is able to finish their footballers' professional education to a far better extent than in England where our players and the home countries' players move to at a young age but miss out on the valuable playing experience at a decent level in their late teens early 20s, and the results have been amazing. Simple, but probably accurate. I went to Anderlecht a few times when I was posted to Brussels in the 90s and its a long way off what I've ever seen in the LOI.

I think it's a well written criticism of the acquisitive nature of English football and the Barcelona statistic was interesting. I'd never heard it before. Of course you know everything already.

Yes, he does say that it's got little to do with coaching and more to do with the acquisitive nature of English football. I don't think he's saying that simply playing kids means they become good payers regardless of their coaching, but what I think he is saying that even well coached kids still may not get their chance because they don't get the professional experience when they need it. Belgium probably benefits most in this regard because their well coached kids get professional experience at just a high enough standard to be in the shop window. The LOI isn't at this standard, as evidenced by Seamus Coleman's experience - Blackpool being his stepping stone.

**ArdeeBhoy** · 15/09/2013, 7:47 PM

Would say the Belgian League is much more like the SPL...based on some Bruges fans I know who regularly attended both.
Though obviously their beer is probably better...

**Charlie Darwin** · 15/09/2013, 8:14 PM

The attendances in the Belgian league are actually fairly evenly spread with no a huge amount of difference between the top 4, albeit there is no team with bumper attendances like Celtic or Rangers: http://www.worldfootball.net/attenda...e-2011-2012/1/

Stutts, I may being a bit over-critical, but my objection lies in the fact it's the same superficial argument that is being put forward in England, and no amount of padding and suspect analysis is going to address its fatal shortcoming, in my opinion. I'm sure Irish and British players do suffer from the Premier League's need for established players ahead of in-house development but I don't think that tendency exists in a vacuum either.

The fact is, as he points out himself with the Belgian example, the major players in the Premier League are coming through but they're coming through from a lower level. I realise he's only giving an overview and not proposing a solution, but surely part of an overview is to point out that there is more than one avenue to the top? There's no connecting of the dots being done. Perhaps the current state of the Premier League points out that Irish players might be better off developing in different leagues, whether that be the Championship, the SPL or further afield. In that case, the junior clubs' insistence on touting players to the biggest academies in search of the biggest transfer fees surely needs to be criticised - is Conor Clifford any better off because he chose to go to Chelsea than to (to pick an example off my head) Nottingham Forest?

It's the fatalism of the argument that kills me. It's the old "world events are conspiring against us" thinking that has captured the British media and which we've seen from the "we just don't have the players, Bill" commentariat in Ireland to justify Trap's intransigence. Beneath all of it lies the naive assumption that any action to reorient the Premier League towards homegrown players would benefit us as much as anybody else.

**BonnieShels** · 16/09/2013, 9:12 AM

Originally Posted by geysir

Brady admits bias in that regard, most can take that into perspective when listening to Liam. I think most people can appreciate that Brady is usually reticent when it comes to typical panel bluster criticism of any team/player.
His presence there for the Ireland games was alone justified in his interventions to bring the lunatic Dunphy to task.

When does Brady admit bias?
Brady's bias is inferred in the inappropriate way he deals with anything connected with Trap.

Lest we not forget he was an initial part of this management team.

**Stuttgart88** · 16/09/2013, 10:31 AM

I thought Sweeney's sidebar in the print edition was also good, putting down the horrible cliche "we don't have the players", citing Iceland's excellent campaign under Lagerback as an example of what can be achieved with less heralded players.

**SwanVsDalton** · 16/09/2013, 3:15 PM

Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

Yes, he does say that it's got little to do with coaching and more to do with the acquisitive nature of English football. I don't think he's saying that simply playing kids means they become good payers regardless of their coaching, but what I think he is saying that even well coached kids still may not get their chance because they don't get the professional experience when they need it. Belgium probably benefits most in this regard because their well coached kids get professional experience at just a high enough standard to be in the shop window. The LOI isn't at this standard, as evidenced by Seamus Coleman's experience - Blackpool being his stepping stone.

I posted this Rory Smith piece elsewhere on the forum, not sure if you seen it - but it interestingly takes on this perception. Belgian coaches asserting that the majority of their best players still had to go abroad at an early age to develop.

The LOI isn't the standard we need it to be, but is Belgium the best counterpart if its best players are still getting cherry picked from 16, 17 or 18 (with a few exceptions)?

**Stuttgart88** · 20/09/2013, 2:07 PM

VERY interesting contribution here, although I'm not convinced by the Rene Meulensteen suggestion.

http://www.thecoachdiary.com/time-to-start-again/

**Drumcondra 69er** · 20/09/2013, 3:46 PM

Originally Posted by geysir

People have just managed to stop smirking when they see or hear his name.

I haven't..... .

**geysir** · 20/09/2013, 4:26 PM

Originally Posted by SwanVsDalton

I posted this Rory Smith piece elsewhere on the forum, not sure if you seen it - but it interestingly takes on this perception. Belgian coaches asserting that the majority of their best players still had to go abroad at an early age to develop.

The LOI isn't the standard we need it to be, but is Belgium the best counterpart if its best players are still getting cherry picked from 16, 17 or 18 (with a few exceptions)?

Rory Smith's piece is lacking some gravitas.
Some players got cherry picked in Belgium when they were in their mid teens.
A few went up the road to Ajax and could come home for lunch now and again, the trains depart on the half hour.
Most Belgian players in the national squad do not get cherry picked in mid teens and can reach intl level whilst growing up in the local league. When they do depart for foreign clubs, they tend to earn a heft fee for the Belgian club.
Of the few players who departed to Ajax and Lille, there is no evidence to suggest that they would not have done very well had they instead signed for a Belgian club.

In my opinion it's a moot argument to show that some of the best players in the Belgian team received their education with Ajax or Lille and that there's no special magic Belgium football education academies which have directly affected the surge in the fate of the national team.
Whats important for the local league, is that the best players can grow up in the set up, before departing for a richer club in a better league.

**Grafter** · 21/09/2013, 7:46 PM

They were saying in Indo today that there's an increasing chance of a caretaker manager for German/Kazak games... now this is quite possibly a smokescreen to take some heat off but if it is a caretaker who could you give it too? An underage manager like King would be most likely?