Giles calls for all Ireland team

[colster]

is it though steve, i work in a multinational company with many many "foreginers" on a daily basis, and only as recently as last week one person asked me where i lived. so i brought them over to the pc ( as i do with many and put up the map of ireland, so they can get a clear understanding of the geographics of IRELAND) and put up a picture and said here, then his next question was:
"is that the part of the united kingdon"

i didnt laugh, i didnt get annoyed, he is a nice guy, i was more upset than anything else. i have found this with many many people, a lot of europeans even!!!! this same lad has been over in the uk for a few years too.

So what? What does it have to do with an All Island team? I've had the same experience. We're a small island. People are naturally going to ask.

I think it would be a good thing to have an All Island team but I don't think it'll happen anytime soon. There are many other more significant stumbling blocks than the perception of our nationality by foreigners.

Anyone who is worried about being perceived as British should get a life. How long does it take to correct someone.

[Dassa]

Now there is no need to blatently lie about it
a vast amount of UJ are clearly visible at windsor for all NI games
You forget that we have BBC NI down and many of us watch the north's games as they are usually on before ours

I know you have BBC down south and Im not a liar. I never said there werent any UJ's present at NI games I said their was little. By this I meant in comparison to the amount of NI flags. I would also like to know what you would call a vast amount in a crowd of 14,000 10,11. Dont dare say i was blatently lieing. heres a link to a photo of the KOp which would be were all the supporters clubs would sit. This was a the Poland game kindly point out all these vast amounts of UJ's.

http://photobucket.com/albums/y140/B...t=DSCN0125.jpg

[colster]

Here I can't help it yous are still just posting sh**e. The only one that seems to have grasped the gist of the argument so far is Colster and he took about 20 posts to cop it.

I grasped it but I still don't understand the logic of it. Again I ask what effect does the perception of our nationality as British have on us?

We are gone way off the football.

You started it.

Paul_o_Shea thanks for the reality check. These people obviously haven’t mixed with any foreigners or alternatively don’t care if they are considered British abroad. I for one don’t like to be considered British but I have no problems with people who don’t mind as is Colster’s argument which is fair enough.

I mind being considered British and yes I have travelled, met and worked with people who mistakenly thought Ireland was part of Britain/UK. I'm proud of being Irish. I just don't see how the perceptions of being British which happens anyway and probably always will has on whether we have an All Island team or not.

[dcfcsteve]

is it though steve, i work in a multinational company with many many "foreginers" on a daily basis, and only as recently as last week one person asked me where i lived. so i brought them over to the pc ( as i do with many and put up the map of ireland, so they can get a clear understanding of the geographics of IRELAND) and put up a picture and said here, then his next question was:
"is that the part of the united kingdon"

i didnt laugh, i didnt get annoyed, he is a nice guy, i was more upset than anything else. i have found this with many many people, a lot of europeans even!!!! this same lad has been over in the uk for a few years too.

POS - all you've exemplified above is the understandable lack of knowledge the world has about Ireland full-stop. Nothing you've said supports this misguided notion YI is peddling that the world is so caught-up with Ireland's identity issue that everyone thinks the Irish are really British - and that therefore having a single football team for the island of Ireland would somehow make Ireland closer to the English and further increase this misunderstanding.

That guy didn't say "Oh - you're from Ireland - you must be British", as YoungIrish is asserting the vast majority of people would do. Instead he was one of the many people I mentioned earlier who's reaction would simply be 'Where/what the feck is Ireland...?'. It was only when you showed him how close we are to Britain that you prompted an 'is that part of the UK comment'. Does he go round thinking you're British now that he knows you're Irish ?

[dcfcsteve]

As for dcfcSteve I still don't know what you're talking about. Of course if you ask is someone from Dublin either Irish or British the majority will say Irish. You are only offering them one option.

Err - well no actuallly. If you ask someone a question with TWO possible responses ('Irish' or 'British') you are offering them TWO options. Not one. So your point is.... ?

My point was if they think Irish people are also British. You obviously still haven't quite grasped basic logic yet but are arguing against the logic of my postings.

As a number of other posters have mentioned, there appears to be very little logic to your arguement. All you keep doing is asserting your view that everyone thinks that Irish people are really British, and that as a result having a single football team for the island of Ireland would only serve to draw us closer to the English, as apparently everyone thinks we're all British anyway ! You've given no justification for why you believe this tangled hypotheses to be the case, and my experience of living, working and travelling to numerous places around the world strongly counteracts what you're saying. No doubt you'll now accuse me of trying to show off how well travelled I am (whilst at the same time talking yourself up as a latter-day Phileas Fogg with your "these people have obviosuly never met any foreigners.." remarks), rather than address the core point I'm making, but that's usually the response of someone who's struggling in an arguement.

Why if you told someone you were one nationality, would they then assume you're another ? In reality this only happens with a miniscule number of nations who have multiple nationalities (in particular, the poor Welsh seem to get this a lot - probably becuae their distinct culture/history is little known outside of Britain). Do you honestly think the French, Spanish, Americans, Australians etc have no idea idea that the 'British' and 'Irish' are separate people with separate cultural and political identities ? Do you think the other 24 member nations of the EU honestly believe that Ireland isn't really a country or poeple, and that were'll all really British ? Do you honestly and truely 100% believe this to be the case ? If so, then we'll just have to agree to disagree...

Regardless - I've yet to see anyone on here supporting your belief that a single team on the island of Ireland would make even more people think the Irish were really British.

Also I'm sure there are many people up North who'd disagree with your assessment and consider themselves British as they are entitled to do. Are they wrong?

Not at all - you can be 'British' without being from 'Britain' (e.g. citizenship given to natives of Gibraltor, Falkland Islands, Northern Ireland etc). And anyways - I thought all Irish were considered British by everyone anyway, so why did you even need to ask....?

[paul_oshea]

So what? What does it have to do with an All Island team? I've had the same experience. We're a small island. People are naturally going to ask.

nothing at all. nothing at all, was just making a point.

dcfcsteve, it has to do with how you were saying ireland is perceived globally!!!! im just stating examples/facts which always finishes arguments, that to the outside world they dont have a fooken clue about hte republic/northern ireland and dont knokw which/any/both are "part of uk" as i have so often been asked. this is what youngirisih was refering too, which you blatantly cut him down and said his view was totally wrong, his view IS what "foregin" people think.

It was only when you showed him how close we are to Britain that you prompted an 'is that part of the UK comment'.

no no no no no, he was blissfully unaware, that was my point, he didnt know whether any/all/both ROI and NI were part of the uk, infering that even if i was i was still part of the uk/britain, therefore i might have well been british in his eyes.

anyhow im all for a united ireland and a united ireland team, i was just trying to let you and others see where he was coming from. if someone has a perception of a country about ireland like the above, then they dont know the difference between the nationality and would lump us all the same.

[youngirish]

Do you honestly think the French, Spanish, Americans, Australians etc have no idea idea that the 'British' and 'Irish' are separate people with separate cultural and political identities? Do you think the other 24 member nations of the EU honestly believe that Ireland isn't really a country or poeple, and that were'll all really British ? Do you honestly and truely 100% believe this to be the case ?

I do believe a very sizable proportion of people in many of those countries think that Irish people are also British as does Paul_OShea judging from his posts. If you disagree that's fine but you claimed in one of your earlier posts that this was one of the most idiotic things you've read on the forum. I don't agree. Possibly I might be wrong but those are my experiences dealing with foreign people (many of whom are British). I think I made a fair point. I'd like to see some other people's opinions on the matter rather than the 3 who keep making a nonsense of the argument.

Consequently I believe if we unify our teams and there is no longer a separate Rep of Ireland team and a Northern Ireland team this will confuse the issue even more and make it harder for certain (admittedly ignorant) foreigners to distinguish between Northern and Southern Ireland as there is no longer the question of why there’s a Northern and Republic team. As was said earlier many people’s knowledge of Ireland stems from these teams. How the reverse and how unifying the teams could decrease the misunderstanding that Irish people are British is what I fail to understand. A lot of foreign people’s understanding of Ireland comes mainly from the British media and the problems in the past in the North. Many don’t recognise the difference between this part of Ireland and the Republic.

Perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps I'm not. Perhaps no one cares but as I've said before it annoys me when foreign people refer to me as British which has happened numerous times before in the past. I’m surprised if you don’t care though. Would it not annoy you if someone referred to you as French because I’m no more British than French, German, Italian, Estonian or any other nationality. As a nation and as we continue to integrate into Europe we start to share more in common with the French and Germans than we do with the English or British who are generally more inward looking and less progressive (in a European sense) than we are.

[Lionel Ritchie]

Here I can't help it yous are still just posting sh**e. The only one that seems to have grasped the gist of the argument so far is Colster and he took about 20 posts to cop it.

Lionel Ritchie you're lucky you're a talented songwriter because again your slating my argument which is fair enough but then trying to justify the slating of it with some of the most insane drivel I've read in a long time. I wasn't asking anyone to guess my accent but if someone did say to me they were from Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia etc I wouldn't for one still refer to them as Soviets or consider them to still be ruled by the USSR or Russia. Maybe you would and you think that's ok which would explain a lot. Anyway those countries haven't been part of the USSR in slightly over a decade while we haven't been ruled by Britain in over eight decades. Slight (enormous) difference.
.

I really dunno whether to get you a shovel or take the one you have off of you.
Do you worry as much about people confusing Ireland with Iceland?
There's only one letter in the difference and it apparently cropped up as a stumbling block some years ago in a Bord Failte or Enterprise Ireland survey. Maybe we should change the name of the country to something more distinctive? Maybe we should get a corporate sponsor to help us market the new brand ...like ...Pepsi presents something more distinctive?

Paul_o_Shea thanks for the reality check. These people obviously haven’t mixed with any foreigners or alternatively don’t care if they are considered British abroad.

...well now I shouldn't boast and a gentleman should never say but I bumped into this blonde busty lass once upon a long ago -she was from Iceland ...or was it Ireland??

[Donal81]

I do believe a very sizable proportion of people in many of those countries think that Irish people are also British as does Paul_OShea judging from his posts. If you disagree that's fine but you claimed in one of your earlier posts that this was one of the most idiotic things you've read on the forum. I don't agree. Possibly I might be wrong but those are my experiences dealing with foreign people (many of whom are British). I think I made a fair point. I'd like to see some other people's opinions on the matter rather than the 3 who keep making a nonsense of the argument.

Consequently I believe if we unify our teams and there is no longer a separate Rep of Ireland team and a Northern Ireland team this will confuse the issue even more and make it harder for certain (admittedly ignorant) foreigners to distinguish between Northern and Southern Ireland as there is no longer the question of why there’s a Northern and Republic team. As was said earlier many people’s knowledge of Ireland stems from these teams. How the reverse and how unifying the teams could decrease the misunderstanding that Irish people are British is what I fail to understand. A lot of foreign people’s understanding of Ireland comes mainly from the British media and the problems in the past in the North. Many don’t recognise the difference between this part of Ireland and the Republic.

Perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps I'm not. Perhaps no one cares but as I've said before it annoys me when foreign people refer to me as British which has happened numerous times before in the past. I’m surprised if you don’t care though. Would it not annoy you if someone referred to you as French because I’m no more British than French, German, Italian, Estonian or any other nationality. As a nation and as we continue to integrate into Europe we start to share more in common with the French and Germans than we do with the English or British who are generally more inward looking and less progressive (in a European sense) than we are.

I still don't understand why it bothers you what people ignorant of the situation think. Honestly, why do you give a toss?

As a youngster, I had the privilege of spending a few summers in the company of a group of female Spanish students. Except that they weren't Spanish, they were from the outskirts of Barcelona. They weren't loud or obnoxious about it, they were simply Catalan and not Spanish. As a 15 year old, I hadn't a clue about the history between the two and was more concerned with less honourable intentions. What some muppet of an Irish 15 year old knew or didn't know about the internal cultures of Spain surely had absolutely no relevance to the issue itself? (Believe me, I now know and appreciate the difference between a Catalan and a Spaniard!)

At the risk of getting too political, does that mean that the concept of a united Ireland should be forgotten about because ignorant Brits, French, Spanish, Germans or Italians don't know the difference? A political movement going back hundreds of years with plenty of support should rely upon the notions of some equally idiotic 15 year old in France? If that's too political, an All Ireland football team, let's say it were to get loads of support, should be forgotten about for the sake of what an ignorant foreigner thinks (who probably has no reason to know any better)?

Or maybe I'm an idiot like dcfcsteve who also disagreed with you?

[Donal81]

Lionel Ritchie you're lucky you're a talented songwriter because again your slating my argument which is fair enough but then trying to justify the slating of it with some of the most insane drivel I've read in a long time. I wasn't asking anyone to guess my accent but if someone did say to me they were from Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia etc I wouldn't for one still refer to them as Soviets or consider them to still be ruled by the USSR or Russia. Maybe you would and you think that's ok which would explain a lot. Anyway those countries haven't been part of the USSR in slightly over a decade while we haven't been ruled by Britain in over eight decades. Slight (enormous) difference.

Lionel Ritchie wasn't asking you if you'd just refer to anyone sounding Eastern European as a Soviet or a Russian, he was asking you would you know the touchy political and cultural differences between Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia casually? It certainly wasn't the most insane drivel I've read in a long time.

[Stuttgart88]

The last time we had this debate (6 months ago or more I think) I was firmly of the view that I did not want a 32 county team. Not because they don't have anything to offer (Taylor, Davis and a few others are easily good enough & their left back, Plymouth's Capaldi, had a blinder in Cardiff, much better than any left-back performance I've seen from one of ours in a long while) but for other reasons.

One of the things I have enjoyed most about following the Republic of Ireland team is the unity of purpose we have shared over the years. There is, or at least was, a bond between all the fans, and between the fans & the players.

I can relate to our "homegrown" players because I know where they're from & I've played on a lot of the same pitches. I can relate to the "anglos" because I was born in the UK myself and my own children will be brought up in the UK. I'm not sure if I ever could relate to the Northern Ireland players though. I'm only a light-green nationalist but I just don't feel that unionist orientated footballers would be representing "me" which is what I feel about the Republic's team, and I think unionist Northern Ireland fans would prefer to keep their own team, which I understand. Nationalist fans can make their choice as it is.

However, notwithstanding the above, certain connections have been broken that have diminished the joy of following Ireland:

I don't think the players give a **** anymore. Certainly not as much as they used to. Maybe this was just a reaction to Kerr's management style though.

Certain aspects of the support annoy me. Booing Man United players because you're a Liverpool fan, or vice versa, p1sses me off. I didn't condone the Rangers booing as I thought it was just a bit of fun, nothing malicious or sectarian, although many made it out to be worse than it was. Once it was incorrectly perceived as being sectarian I was glad it was stopped though - our reputation for fairness is something I take pride in. But could we trust our own fans to spare players like Ivan Sproule, who'd be representing us, the full treatment?

In general, I don't think many of the newer fans appreciate the essence of following our team. I even heard some young lads singing "Irish till I Die" recently, evoking an association with the English Far Right, though probably unwittingly.

The antipathy from certain eL fans towards those of us whose first love is the national team is divisive.

So maybe all I used to enjoy most about following Ireland is gone, never to return as it was. As with all things, it evolves and it's up to me to accept the new reality. And they're obviously not deal-breaking complaints anyway.

But how can we possibly expect a sense of unity with our Northern counterparts when we were so bitterly divided ourselves over Roy Keane, over booing Rangers players, over whether living in Cork is better than in Dublin, and so on. Factions would probably develop within the team too. The team needs more unity at the moment, not less.

Maybe unification would drive out the worst elements of both support though, leaving only those who are happy to follow their country through thick and thin. Who knows? But although I fully agree with Donal81 that foreigners' ignorance should not be a concern of ours, I think our country's unique past & unique divisions create a unique problem which I'd rather not add to my list of gripes about following Ireland these days.

[paul_oshea]

Certain aspects of the support annoy me. Booing Man United players because you're a Liverpool fan, or vice versa, p1sses me off. I didn't condone the Rangers booing as I thought it was just a bit of fun, nothing malicious or sectarian, although many made it out to be worse than it was.

stuts i agree with a lot of what you are saying, but that is a total contradiction in those two lines, booing occurs because your a celtic fan. simple as.

[Lionel Ritchie]

Agree with Paul on that last point.

Also

Plymouths Capaldi, had a blinder in Cardiff,

...and a complete nightmare against England at Old Tatters. Gently tee'd up the ball for Lampard to bury Englands first while attempting to play a square ball on the edge of his own box with four white jerseys around him.

[CraftyToePoke]

would players of the unionist tradidion of northern ireland be inspired to give their all for such a side anyway? would they even play for it? i dont know the religions of the players of the north nor do i reallty want to but i read a piece recently with Davis of villa saying he grew up as a huge rangers fan, would you get the best from a guy of that mindset in an all-ireland set-up?

[Marked Man]

would players of the unionist tradidion of northern ireland be inspired to give their all for such a side anyway? would they even play for it? i dont know the religions of the players of the north nor do i reallty want to but i read a piece recently with Davis of villa saying he grew up as a huge rangers fan, would you get the best from a guy of that mindset in an all-ireland set-up?

Not that I think it'll happen any time soon, but I think that if players from a Unionist background thought that they were playing for an Ireland team that represented all people on the island, as opposed to playing for a team that was really just representing catholic nationalist Ireland, then they would give it their all. I don't doubt that Ulster unionists on the rugby team give anything other than their best for the team.

[dcfcsteve]

Not that I think it'll happen any time soon, but I think that if players from a Unionist background thought that they were playing for an Ireland team that represented all people on the island, as opposed to playing for a team that was really just representing catholic nationalist Ireland, then they would give it their all. I don't doubt that Ulster unionists on the rugby team give anything other than their best for the team.

A good point.

Do Catholic/Nationalist players in the Northern Ireland squad also not give their all for the team ? Martin O'Neill and Gerry Armstrong might disagree with you if you said no...