I read it initially for free. Must have been paywalled later.Originally Posted by nr637
Basically says there are 40 leagues who won't accept the change, so the FAI might capitulate to them.
The most galling thing for me reading that was the line about the FAI making an incredible offer to the SFAI to postpone the change to a calendar season for THREE YEARS and the SFAI still rejected it as they don't want any change at all.
The only option left seems to be the suspension of funding, insurance, accreditation etc. to force the SFAI to get in line. Which would obviously be a terrible and pretty nuclear option that I don't see happening, especially considering the SFAI have 30 votes on the FAI's General Assembly (and therefore have a big say in the election of the FAI's President).
If Cooke et al walk back on this change, do we think they should resign as they publicly pushed it so much?
There is just a political reality here that the FAI Executive cannot force the leagues to make the change. There isnt the political capital for the nuclear options here and the external political actors have shown a willingness to back the leagues on this one.
Like what do you do here ?
Isnt it a bit coincidental that other parts of the national game are asserting themselves at a time that the senior game is experiencing growth and a real sense of confidence and identity - back in the box then! Maybe there is a way forward with county tyled teams simply as it can include more of these egos in the senior game, give them a vested interest. The capacity for division and infighting in this country never fails to amaze me, how on earth did we manage to cobble together any kind of country???
Agreed, it's just a non-runner politically. But since Cooke and a few others are up for election at the end of the year they could have tried to play hard ball, knowing they would be gone by Dec.
This feels like they're going out with a whimper instead of going down fighting.
By giving people a common enemy - in our case, it was the Brits!Then it was anyone who we perceived to side with the Brits... And now, it's anyone who doesn't agree with the status quo!!
A cop out/pragmatic approach for rural clubs anyway may be to allow them to run both Winter & Summer seasons.
With the aligned summer season being recognised as the priority (longer) and what we're trying to funnel higher levels of the game into.
The Winter season would be shorter, but allow kids from Gaa centred backgrounds to still get involved in the game, and develop their abilities and interests in it and potentially move towards the elite level and summer season should their ability allow.
This is based off my belief that a lot of leagues are worried about what would happen to playing numbers if the seasons completely clashed with each over and playing both was impossible.
Ultimately I think this is the right thread because i think the solution here is to push leagues into the gaps and kind of make summer football inevitable.
like the third tier is going to do a fair bit of lifting if it get going properly pulling more regional powerhouse clubs into summer football and filling out the gaps between it and the country or regional leagues with a structure that puts summer football in place creates a more organic pressure to gravitate towards summer football than merely imposed from above.
I'm a touch more charitable, I think the people here are mostly resistant because its the conventional wisdom that it will be hard for them to sustain going up against the other summer sports. I think that they are wrong but equally theyll say they run a league and I don't.
The FAI has to be taken as the organisation that it is not the one we wish it to be and the political reality was that even though the vote was won, it was not won by enough to prevent this happening
I also have a sneaking suspicion that there are too many weak clubs in Ireland and that in a more Darwinian world there would be mergers and clubs folding but equally thats a really hard thing to ask the people running those clubs to accept
Last edited by Roones26; 30/07/2025 at 11:56 AM.
You are right but if such thinking was widely supported we would have Louth United v North Dublin v South Dublin, Greater Dublin v Munster etc. Passively though non-senior clubs should probably be just allowed to....evolve even if it means extinction. As an extesion of that maybe we should just plough on with plans for the senior game, confidently, and as is mentioned the minnowists may just have to fall in to line. It takes the FAI to uphold a democratic decision though. I do think funding is key, you need affiliation to get grants so set certain criteria for affiliation. In the past the issue was needing to integrate underage for UEFA/FIFA regulations but we have national leagues now if threatened by thi group.
According to certain social media outlets the FAI have reduced the number of clubs interested in the new third tier league structure from 67 down to 37 after the initial grading process.
Source ?
The audio-visual production industry must have been working at full pelt nationwide this Summer to produce 37 National-League quality promotional DVDs
It was a LOI Group chat I scanned over the weekend. There was a piece that mentioned Skerries FC not being accepted but were continuing with their plans to enter the league in the future.
I think mobile phones are all the rage now, Tik-Tok & Instagram are quiet popular social media platforms that enable users to create, share, and interact with content.The audio-visual production industry must have been working at full pelt nationwide this Summer to produce 37 National-League quality promotional DVDs
I read this post (on the subject) first and then went back to the origin - I assumed it was all a euphemism for weed or such substances rather than an actual biodiversity find...especially given it's Ballymun :-)The club's crest still features the notorious 7 towers of the old estate, which are long gone now. They should consider updating it to add in their new found rare plant, instead of clinging to a part of the area's history that everyone was very happy to see erased
Here they come! It’s the charge of the “Thanks” Brigade!
Which greens do you think he's proposing to eat?
You can't spell failure without FAI
DVDs are of course ancient, scarily for some of us now becoming collectables and the platforms you mention are the current cutting edge; But usually on here mention of DVDs is a not so subtle nod to Galway Uniteds appliction to join a new invitational Premier Division at the expense of Dundalk almost 20 years ago. Dundalk since have 5 titles, 3 FAI Cups, 3 Leagues Cups, a few others and EL groups. Galway United on the other hand.....ceased to exist (never miss a chance to comment on this, I'll forgive and forget one day....maybe).
Just in case you are lucky enough to be young enough not to remember the whole "farce" its in here https://www.balls.ie/football/fai-ne...protest-164544
OK, that's it. I'm going to spend the rest of my life focusing on bringing down Dundalk, not just the club, the whole town.
Talk about kicking a fella when he's down
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