Irish Independent
Stephen Ireland - ‘Trap I’m all yours!’ writes Daniel McDonnell
Friday March 04 2011
Stephen Ireland has sensationally thrown his hat into the ring for the Republic’s crucial upcoming match versus Macedonia at the Aviva Stadium. ‘‘It’s been heartbreaking missing out on international football. All I’ve ever wanted to do as a kid was to play for Ireland. Mr.Trapattoni has enquired with the management team at Newcastle about my fitness. When Alan Pardew told me I was ecstatic. The gaffer gratefully gave me his blessing to travel over should Mr.Trapattoni pick me in the squad. But I’m ready to come back. I’m just waiting for the call really.’’
This is a remarkable turnaround from the Cork native who as recently as yesterday shunned any notion of a return to international football. Surprisingly Trapattoni has not been known to court players who have incurred his wrath in the past so this really is out of left field. John Delaney was unavailable for comment this morning on the matter but an FAI insider has said that Delaney will back the managers choice of squad 100%. All eyes now turn to Trapattoni who announces his squad next week. Presumably Ireland will play behind a partnership of Doyle and Long and his grannies may be in the stands to watch it all. Now wouldn’t that be remarkable!
Trap, it sickens me that decent, law abiding citizens like yourself can’t even park their car in the street without galavanting gangs of Corrib Village dwelling, Pot Noodle eating, Buckfast-fuelled scumbags led by the likes of Watch the Break committing wanton acts of violence on your property. They are scum, and with the help of my populist rhetoric, they will soon get what’s coming to them.
Heard the interview, nothing interesting, just him whining and moaning about being hard done by and things being taken out of context. He’d be far better off standing by what he says. He is not a man of his convictions. He contradicts himself endlessly and was clearly only doing it because his family told him to do it.
Joker.
I think mbb is on a kinda Zlatan wum the lads are on here with the past year. If Jaime O’ Hara & Ireland play for Ireland i’ll not be supporting them, i think we have more pride than playing these tossers.
Thats not the feeling i get from people in general. But if you want to support such a team off with ya, its everyones choice. I have never agreed with all of the people we have had play for us. Most have been genuine, but a few you’d really have to wonder about. And there is no wondering about O’ Hara.
You and these many people you speak of already support a team and a country that capped Paul Butler, I am merely pointing out the fact that if you wished to grab the high moral ground about who The Republic of Ireland should or shouldnt cap, you missed the boat by more than a decade.
In fairness kev we have picked many cricketers, rugby players etc who wouldn’t have had us as their first choice. Did it stop you supporting Ireland in those sports?
I actually am not aware of the case, the name is familiar, but i really don’t know the situation.
Who in rugby? If you use guys who have been nationalized (as in living, working & paying taxes in Ireland) then i don’t think that counts, there is every reason to believe they got engrained into our culture and were part of it. I think thats different. What rugby players grew up in England (or anywhere) tried for a number of years to play for them, couldn’t make it and then openly said they wanted to play for England, but sure Ireland will do now as my grand parents are Irish? O’ Hara has blatently (as has Ireland by the way) said on a number of occassions said they don’t want to play for Ireland, but should they want to in the future they’d might bless us with their presence. I’d wonder how many times if ever was O’ Hara even in Ireland.
I’m not taking moral high ground, in general i have no problem as most guys are genuine. O’ Hara hasn’t been and he has more or less insulted us to our face. I have massive problems with Cascarino & Lawrenson as well for what it is worth.
Another point, we have James McCarthy who has declared for a long time he wants to play for us, in a similar position to O’ Hara, but is a superior prospect in both ability and age. Why not concentrate on him.
Yeah some fair points there. In rugby I’d be thinking of someone like Dion O’Cuinneagain or Kevin Maggs. Maggs was only picked after Ashton came across him by chance while DO’C played for South Africa at sevens. Don’t question their commitment (though DO’C struck me as particularly annoying) but would they have chosen us ahead of England or SA?
Just because there are no quotes from someone shouldn’t lead us to believe that players always chose us as their number one. O’Hara was perhaps foolish in talking about his desire to play for England previously though if he isn’t bothered about playing for us then best to leave it. What is your problem with Cascarino? Fully accept Lawrenson tries to have it both ways but Cascarino doesn’t seem to suffer from same level of confusion.
Hope McCarthy can make impact and even feature against Macedonia perhaps
Problem with Cascarino is basically he had no Irish at all in him and lied about. Now you could argue that shows an even bigger desire to play for us, but its just very dodgy. I certainly would have a bigger issue with Lawrenson.
Anyway you are also right about players who have thought about playing for England or whoever, of course that would be natural. I’d say Chris Morris, Aldridge and many others did. But they kept it quite, and showed real desire to play for us then. O’ Hara hasn’t. Its that simple. We have enough stupid footballers ourselves without bringing in another (relatively average as well) stupid professional footballer.
I do see the side as well where people just see the team as “Ireland” and want results and see how it would make the country happy and all that. I get it. I just don’t want O’ Hara because of his carry on, i feel its insulting. And i don’t want Ireland because he will almost without any doubt divide the team and country again. I don’t either though go along with people saying he should “have to” and really “want to” play for his country. He is under no obligation, and he should be left alone, he clearly can’t take the pressure.
