No, the year is 2025 and a bunch of mendacious thieves are still trying to apply what they’ve aped from the previous head thief.
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People wouldnt even have heard of Stephen Bradley under his watch
Dela promoted Spock which was an error but it showed his faith in the grassroots.
His only crime was he cared too much…
Can I ask you a question?
My god - Rennie and Tierney rattled him something awful on Sunday
He hasn’t gone away you know…
New Chief football officer required.
Maybe the FAI think this is the right way. smaller numbers playing their games, but only playing soccer and nothing else. I completely and totally disagree, but if they think they will longterm improve things by having fewer players playing, but doing it in summer, then they may as well drive on. It will kill soccer outside of Dublin though, and I think thats the main point, this is very much a Dublin centric plan. Dublin doesnt do underage GAA in summer, yet the majority of the rest of the country does. Dublin doesnt have as much a dual sport issue as rurally. Pretty much any chap or girl who plays soccer rurally, plays GAA, and vica versa. But most will pick GAA. Some wont, and thats where you get the likes of Seamus Coleman, Kevin Doyle, John O Shea, etc who play GAA but ultimately chose soccer when they get older. If those lads were made to chose when 11 or 12, there is a likelihood they’d pick GAA. So I dont get why the FAI would deliberately diminish their numbers. The organisations can work side by side and still produce soccer or GAA players when kids get older and figure out which they are better at or prefer.
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Good post. Seems bananas from the fai… essentially pitting it’s sport and it’s volunteers against their peers in other sports. GAA, soccer, basketball and rugby all work well together in my area to avoid clashes in game times etc as much as possible to avoid making kids choose. This operates on goodwill and common sense more than any mandate on the clubs parts
I wouldn’t be so convinced though that GAA will wipe out soccer. There is a cohort of “new Irish” (don’t know how to say it other than that ) who play plenty sports but will almost certainly prioritise soccer. Soccer is also a far easier game to play for younger kids. My lad would pick GAA all day over soccer but wouldn’t be cut and dried amongst all his pals
Yeah the new irish will play soccer, as always. And urban areas will be fine. But the problem being like you say you will have splits rurally and there wont be enough for a soccer team and my fear is that it would become something like rugby in wexford where you have teams in town areas only and if you want to play, you travel in rather than play in your local village. Now maybe they can make it work like rugby on smaller numbers, but i dont think so. I think reducing playing numbers rather than expanding is beyond stupid.
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I’m still doubtful calendar year soccer will go ahead, if it does plenty of counties including our own will definitely be looking down the breakaway route, I’ve nothing against summer soccer but I’ve a massive issue against the right to arrange your calendar being taken away which the vote pre Xmas did.
Twice as many people play football ahead of the two gga sports, so im not sure why you think we shouldnt play summer football so as to favour a minority sport?
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Nobody has an issue with summer soccer, if you want it in Dublin, good luck go for it, in many parts of Ireland it would be a disaster and there’s absolutely no appetite for it, in underage especially alot of people do coaching in both sports so even logistically it will be a disaster.
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33% of leagues play it already and another 33% committed to it
It will make players better
Having an overall development plan with alligned seasons makes sense, hqving lads that run sunday amateur leagues foccusing on whats good for them doesnt
And to point out again, football playing numbers shit on gga playing numbers
As I said if you want it, good luck go for it but in parts of Ireland you’ll actually lose clubs, don’t think some realise the consequences of it.
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Meh, time football started looking out for itself and not worry about minority sports.
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They’re actively discouraging lads playing soccer in rural Ireland with that new calendar. I won’t play soccer again after 2027/28 (I think that’s when it’s coming in for Wexford?). Canham left a clanger before he exited the building.
I think it won’t happen in Wexford, on the back off that meeting in Carlow a few weeks ago I could see a regional or south eastern league being set up.
The FAIs problem is shit facilities. If they had decent pitches then winter leagues would be no issue.
Will finish soccer in West Limerick. Second teams will disappear and you’ll have the premier and division one clubs left. It’s struggling anyway for numbers.
I’m sure that won’t be the case everywhere. In Limerick city it probably won’t majorly impact because most of those lads are soccer first anyway.
How is losing second teams ‘finishing soccer’? I think there is a fair bit of exaggerating going on on both sides of this debate.
Soccer like it or not is a professional sport with a pyramid structure. It’s totally different to gaa even the way it’s organized at u9 level with streamed teams etc. Maybe there is an argument that pushing the best players to concentrate on it exclusively and give up gaa will be better for Irish international teams in the future. It’s probably worth a try from their point of view