But they do have more than 4 teams?
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Nobody is ashamed of the AIL. The AIL itself began in the early 90s. It had preeminence as the top level domestic competition in Ireland for not even a decade, with regular Irish internationals togging out along with Ireland A players- doesn’t happen anymore because of design. Some boys are fairly hung up on that, lacking perspective and an appreciation for the facts.
It’s the top domestic competition in Ireland… The provinces have gone on and done their own thing for what you say is the betterment of the game … That’s fine, but the AIL is the top domestic rugby competition.
The NFL has 32 teams covering one team for every 10 million. Ireland has 4 pro teams for a population of 6 million.
The NRL, like rugby here, has a team for every 1.5m of the population.
I could go on…
The League of Ireland has over 20 clubs vying to be in the top domestic tier of Irish soccer. Those clubs combined barely beat one of the Irish rugby provinces annual paid home attendance. In the real world, we all know who has the problem here. Hope you enjoy watching your home teams of Celtic and Chelsea this weekend.
League of Ireland: cross border competition
Pro14: cross border competition
Ireland won a handful of test matches in the 1990’s. They went from 1989 to 2000 without winning the Centenary Quaich, from 1994 to 2001 without winning the Millenium Trophy. Since 2000 they’ve won the Centenary Quaich on 15 occasions and the Millenium Trophy on 10 occasions. Three triple crowns, 3 European Championship wins (with a Grand Slam in 2009), the Lansdowne Cup and the Admiral Brown Cup on a number of occasions too.
Derry are Irish mate — Are you trying to deny their Irishness? What links do Welsh teams and Scotch teams have to Ireland?
Lots of things damaged the club game, not just the decision by the IRFU making the top of our domestic pyramid the Pronvices. Changing lifestyle habits, paying mercenaries and lack of investment in facilities (due to the aforementioned wastage on players) have all changed the club game.
Derry is in the United Kingdom. That is an accepted fact by Ireland which removed all territorial claims to the island. This is recognised by international treaties. British.
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the pretend lads can’t handle that LondonDerry is british
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Imagine the Munster captain opening his post to find he’s been sent a little trophy from Geoff congratulating him on winning The Geoffrey Boycott Interprovinical Series
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As part of that process we all also agreed that people born on the Island have a right to their Irish identity and to be regarded as Irish - Derry City are Irish.
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so our rugby team is made up of 2 countries? Any other rugby team have this sort of advantage?
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how do the pretend nationalists (who never set foot in the North) square up their support of the partitionist free state soccer team and their hatred of a proper All Ireland team like the rugby team, I find that fascinating
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I think everyone of the forum would get behind a united football team – it’s rugby as a sport they are against , not the all Ireland nature of it.
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Quaich? Is that what Harry Potter plays?
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Sweep sweep sweep