A Yard of Grass

Well it’s been a pretty bad year for Irish football. From the highs of 2016, with the decent showing in France, Dundalk’s epic performances on the continent, through to a phenomenal start to the World Cup campaign, 2017 was a massive let down. Only a few moments stood out and while there are glimmers of hope, we have a mountain to climb as a football nation. So by way of a review of sorts, let’s look back at the stand out characters, good and bad, and remember some we lost.

Seán Maguire

“Seán Maguire! Who else!” is how I recall George Hamilton’s commentary on Seánie’s late late extra-time winner in the 2016 FAI Cup Final. It capped off an incredible season in which he scored 28 goals in all competitions. He was the hottest property in Irish domestic football. But by the time the Cup Final rolled around again in 2017, he was a much lamented absence for the Irish national team through injury. A whirlwind year was, in its first half, totally dominated by Maguire and Cork City. They had, for all intents and purposes, wrapped up the title by July with an astonishing 22 game unbeaten run. He was snapped up by Preston North End in June and up to his injury had scored 4 goals in 12 games and had his first senior cap. He remains out with that hamstring injury but will return to play a part in the pre World Cup friendlies no doubt and help PNE push for promotion. The Nations League will provide the perfect environment for him from late 2018 but for 2017 he was the undoubted star of Irish Football.

Neil Taylor

Coming out of Lansdowne Road that evening, we had no idea that not only was Seamus Coleman in real trouble, but that that one tackle would have such a defining impact on our entire football year. Neil Taylor mad a bad challenge, he didn’t intentionally set out to deliver a potential career-ender, and he’s not to blame for how our campaign went. But the loss of Coleman was felt as we struggled towards the end for real quality and true leadership to compensate for Martin O’Neill’s dreadful tactics. Seamus will be back probably stronger than before, but this one tackle further darkened the shadow over Irish football for the last 9 months of 2017, a shadow which was created by another man from the north-west…

Martin O’Neill

Enough has been written and said about his approach to each game in 2017. His character and personality has dominated Irish football life this year. From his inexplicably hostile attitude to interviewers, to his arch-conservative anti-football tactics, O’Neill blew all of 2016’s goodwill to shite this year. Against Wales, it was a battle and a result we could live with. Against Austria we were woeful for 70 minutes and only woke up after we scored. Away to Georgia was an absolute disgrace, as was the home game to Serbia. That one point from 6 meant we had gone from top of the group to needing results IN OTHER GROUPS just to get to a play-off, which was incredible. We got those results and then squeezed past Wales. The less said about Denmark the better. O’Neill blew it. He blew it spectacularly with a mind-numbingly stupid double substitution at half-time at only 2-1 down. No excuses. He must learn or step aside.

Christian Eriksen

He has to be mentioned. Even though Martin O’Neill gifted him the amount of Dublin 4 real estate Seán Dunne would have killed for in the boom, it still took talent to take that space and lacerate Ireland almost single handedly. Relive it here with some dodgy shite for a soundtrack. Probably Danish…

James McClean

In a sign that it wasn’t only in football where the country struggled, James McClean was nominated for RTE Sports Personality of the Year for 2017. As I mentioned earlier, the absence of Séamus Coleman led to a dearth of leaders towards the end of the campaign, and it seemed a lot of people expected James to carry the team forward. But he’s not made like that. He is a national hero and a great lad in many ways, and the game against Wales elevated him. But it also came very, very close to telling us all we need to know about him, the good and the bad. As we neared the final whistle, seconds from the desperately needed victory, and one admittedly provided by McClean’s boot, he charged in to a Welsh player and gave away a stupid free kick close to the box on our left. Had they scored from that free, both sides were gone, and this man’s career would have been summed up in one evening. But nothing came of it, and McClean was lauded as our best player of the campaign. He was definitely that, with 2 monster away goals in Vienna and Cardiff winning matches for us. He represents a lot that is absolutely needed in football today and deserves all the plaudits he gets for his honesty and integrity. He has his faults and his limitations but he is probably the most loved Irish footballer of this generation. And you can’t achieve much more than that in this game… I’ll raise a toast to him this Christmas…

Jimmy Magee

This man was a genius. A total sports nerd in the best way imaginable. The sort of person that isn’t made anymore. His career was a phenomenal one. Every World Cup since 1966 and every Olympics since 1968. I’m sure you all read the tributes paid to him and are well aware of his most famous contributions to the Irish airwaves. His off-the-cuff rendition of every single Olympic medal won by an Irish athlete as John Treacy came down the home straight in to claim a silver medal in Los Angeles is among the best ever heard by an audience here. But I think his simple yet effective less is more approach to Diego Maradona’s waltz through the English defence two years later in Mexico might top it. To keep quiet and simply reiterate the one phrase – “different class” – at the right time is an all too increasingly under-rated skill in an era where silence from a commentator is almost feared as something that needs constant filling regardless of there being anything to say. Jimmy let the crowd do the talking and the viewers see for themselves.

Ryan McBride

Warrior. Leader. Gentleman. Some of the words used to describe the Derry captain on his tragic passing in March, aged just 27. Derry is a small city, which has put a massive stamp on football in the Republic since 1985 and you really felt how Ryan’s tragic death rocked the entire place. The tributes to him have painted a picture of a wonderful young man and I have no real place to say any more than those who knew him best already have. So I leave you with this one quote from Ryan, which sums up how much his local club meant to this child of the Brandywell, and shows us all that sometimes the elusive thing that you need, or you think you need, in any walk of life, may just have been on your doorstep all along:

“Other players have dreams of going across the water and playing for Man United and Celtic but my dream as a boy was to play for Derry City and that dream came true”

The aim of the Ryan McBride Foundation is to help young people to realise their full potential. The Foundation aims to support, assist and inspire young players to achieve what Ryan achieved and to assist groups that Ryan supported during his life. I wish it all the best. His death truly shocked Irish football this year, and I hope his family, friends and team-mates will get the support they need this Christmas from the close-knit soccer community in Derry and across Ireland.

 

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Thanks for reading, commenting, sharing and liking Yard of Grass throughout 2017. See you soon…

I’m a left-back. I haven’t darkened the doors of an 11-a-side game in 15 years but I am still a left-back. Despite playing 5-a-side for several years – up until a nasty leg-break in 2007 – I never enjoyed it quite like the real thing. Because I am a left-back and the skillset of such a player was never quite suited to the hectic, frenetic chaos that defines the 5-a-side game. The post-work astro matches, or indoor knockabouts did not lend themselves to raking passes down the line to the winger, overlaps followed by sweeping dangerous crosses, last-ditch sliding tackles, or the less spectacular jockeying of a winger down a blind alley, the latter probably the most satisfying of all. Let alone the one thing that we in the left-back union seem to possess more than anyone else – the killer dead ball. I never played at a very high-level for a multitude of technical footballing reasons, but stick me 25 yards from goal, or at the corner flag, and you were guaranteed a perfect delivery. I’m sure my former team mates in Portmarnock, St. Joseph’s and Granada FC will testify to that. Scoring corners was also a speciality between the ages of 10 and 13. In one of my earliest games for Joeys, with my new team mates blissfully unaware of this skill, my Dad snuck up to the corner flag and told me to shoot. I did and I scored. Full-size goals and miniature under-12 keepers helped. But it had to be on target and it usually was. As for free-kicks, well as many left-backs have proven over many years, we are effing lethal!

What inspired this post was the performance of Alberto Moreno against Sevilla last week. He is everything that I hate about the modern full-back. A show pony with far too many tattoos and not nearly enough discipline. He seems to have ascended to the Champions League level without having a notion of where he is supposed to be on the pitch. He looks good in attack, but has little end product, and is guaranteed to make an absolute balls-up at least once a game. But I don’t blame him. All he can do is play his best. It’s up to his manager to rein him on, or drag him off. His utter inability to be in the right place at the right time cost Liverpool 2 goals and ultimately 2 points. I’ve been hearing that he’s been better this year, but better than useless is still not good enough, and unlike David Luiz who seems to have shaken off his Sideshow Bob persona to become an essential part of the Chelsea defence, excelling in last year’s title win, I can’t see Moreno making the same journey. So let’s have a quick look at who we are comparing him to? Let’s talk about some of my favourite left-backs, some of whom had a huge influence on me when I played…

And we start with the much-maligned Steve Staunton. The first Irish international to reach 100 caps and the only man to represent this country at 3 World Cups. In 1990, a 12-year old me watched this guy in awe as he was part of the last Liverpool title-winning team and Jack’s Army in Italia ’90. He was a hero of mine, and I choose to ignore those who belittle him as a result of his managerial ambitions. He was solid. He never looked in danger, and he could attack as well. He played great crosses and was absolutely lethal with a dead ball, and he even once copied me by scoring a corner for Ireland. He also adapted into the role of centre-half for a lot of his career, which shows a degree of flexibility you seldom get these days. Could you have trusted Ashley Cole beside John Terry, for example? If you’re of a certain young age, you can be forgiven for thinking of  Stan only as the bumbling manager with the thick Louth drawl. If you’re my age or over and you still think of him that way, and that way only, then you are choosing to be ridiculously unfair to a great Irish international. He scored a lot of goals but this is probably my favourite for two reasons, (i) it starts off outside the far post and (ii) the magnificent sound it makes as it mills into the stanchion.

Staunton’s career overlapped with probably Ireland’s greatest ever full-back, certainly the best I’ve known in the last 30 years, Denis Irwin. Another perfect Irish footballer – humble, free of bullshit, efficient, effective and lethal when he wanted to be. Despite being a Corkman and a United man, I have nothing but admiration for him and his service to both the game and to the profile of the full-back. Of course, Irwin could play right and left back without any difference in the quality of the performance. My favourite Irwin moment though – and I’m sure many of you will agree – was actually provided by a Frenchman with a very different approach to the game and, presumably, to life.

Marvellous stuff!

As an Irishman, and moreover as an Irish football fan, you are simply reared to hate the English national team. You are bred to mock their every failure and dread the day they might actually do something. YoG waxed extensively on England last year after their humiliation at the hands of Iceland. While Euro ’88 saw this begrudgery play out in combination with absolute Irish euphoria in Stuttgart, it wasn’t until Italia ’90 when the nasty begrudgery for the sake of it really hit me. I was perhaps a tad too young to scorn the theft of their dreams by the cheating Maradona in ’86, but 4 years later I wasn’t. And at Italia ’90, it was a left-back for England who was one half of the pair of scapegoats for their eventual failure (by their standards) along with Chris Waddle. Stuart Pearce. Psycho. He missed a penalty in the shoot-out against West Germany in the semi-final which sent a very , very good English team out, Gazza and all. But don’t let that define him. Stuart Pearce was mighty. Legs like tree-trunks; a dead-ball assassin; an absolute bastard of a tackler; and the scorer of some unreal goals. And let’s not forget the massive pair of bollocks he has on him to come back for the Three Lions under the Twin Towers and do this 6 years after his humiliation in Italy.

Everything great about English football in one raging celebration.

 

Of course, this is not a list of the best ever left-backs, just the ones who I feel personified the position for me. There are enough top tens and interminable lists on other sites around the net without me adding to it, so please don’t think I’m saying Steve Staunton was a better player than Andreas Brehme, Roberto Carlos or Lizarazu! One thing these lists seem to have in common however, is the name in top spot – Paolo Maldini.

While he didn’t possess the dead ball skills or the ability to get himself a half-dozen or so penalties or free-kick goals a season, he undoubtedly epitomised everything about Italian defending. Relentless discipline; the ability to know what an attacker would do before he did; and the type of beguiling composure on the ball that 99% of full-backs would kill for. The names above are legends for their teams and countries. Paolo Maldini is an icon of the game itself. The most striking statistic about Maldini for me is that only 2 clubs – Real Madrid and his own Milan – have won more European Cups than him. He has 5 – the same as Barcelona and Liverpool, and with 18 years separating the first and last. Staggering. When he later moved into the centre, he was quoted as saying “If I have to make a tackle then I have already made a mistake”. What a wonderfully Italian way to look at it; tackling as a sign of your failure to read where the game was going. He made his debut in the 1984-85 season and his last game was in 2008-09. 647 appearances for one club, a club he helped shape and define.

While youtube provides a great resource for looking back at the career highlights of footballers, I don’t think a 30 second or 2-minute clip can ever do justice to what this man represented. The greatest left-back that ever played was also the one who looked the greatest. The scraggy hair; the piercing eyes; the untucked jersey (always the correct number 3) and the effortless stride. Growing up glued to Football Italia in the late 80’s / early 90’s, I think every kid who played his position simply wanted to be him. I know I did. As such, Maldini needs only a picture…

We’ll leave it there so…

Reality hit us hard last night in Ballsbridge. You’ve probably seen and heard enough hand-wringing to last until the next competitive game in late 2018, so I’ve just a few things I think we need to consider about the Irish national team.

1. We don’t have the Players

This mantra, this deafening, repetitive mantra is a load of absolute bollox. We have the players to qualify. We’ve proved that as often as not in the last 4 campaigns. Let’s not look back with rose-tinted glasses at the Jack Charlton and Mick McCarthy eras. Tommy Coyne of Motherwell played up front on his own in Giants Stadium, Alan McLoughlin and a clubless Gary Breen scored vital famous goals. “But none play in the top 4 in the Premier League, and none feature in the latter stages of the Champions League”, I hear them cry!!! How many of our Quarter-final reaching Italia 90 squad would get near those 2 standards today?? Bonner, NO, Morris, NO, Staunton, NO, McCarthy not a fucking chance. We could go on, but outside of Paul McGrath and maybe Ronnie Whelan, you’d be hard pushed to find any in among the Bernie Slavens and Tony Cascarinos that would excite the likes of Guardiola and Pochettino. Ditto USA 94, where Roy Keane and Denis Irwin had emerged to add to that list. By 2002, we could push a case for Robbie Keane and Damien Duff, but their respective club careers would suggest somewhat otherwise. And let’s not forget John O’Shea and Steve Finnan, who have a few Champions League medals and finals between them, albeit from a good few years back – would they get near them now?

Yes you can argue that the standard is lower now and you would be right, but lets stop losing our shit over this issue. Andy Townsend was not Nemanja Matic or Kevin de Bruyne. We have the players. We absolutely have the players to qualify for tournaments. They CAN play football. Even last night, when they did knock it about on those rare occasions, they created great chances. We have the players.

2. But do we have the Manager?

Eamon Dunphy got a lot of grief when he called Martin O’Neill “Trappatoni with a Derry accent”. He was wrong, but not that wrong. We need to move away from these conservative managers that seem to believe point 1 above. Trap really thought we had nothing, preferring Paul Green to Andy Reid or Wes, and insisting on a brutal brand of anti-football. Under O’Neill we’ve seen flashes of very good performances, notably in Paris and Lille last year, but also great tactical discipline in holding off Germany in Dublin. But throughout all of our campaigns under both these veterans, we have played abysmal stuff, most notably at home in this campaign. We need young blood at the helm, or at least for O’Neill to change his ways. Let’s not be rash. One qualification, albeit via a 3rd place finish, a last 16 in the tournament (again from a 3rd place finish) and a play-off defeat having come runners-up as 4th seeds, is no mean feat, and last night, despite its dreadfulness, including dreadful substitutions, was far from a sacking offence. Had we just drawn with Wales and had a nice wee friendly last night instead, O’Neill’s future would be secure.

3. Worst fans in the World

This offensive myth about the Irish being the best fans in the world can be well and truly consigned to the dustbin now. We can be truly awful. A bunch of drunk, smartphone-wielding up-for-the-craic, constantly aware of how much craic we are, irritating little fuckers, whose own sense of greatness is utterly nauseating. I say that because these fairweather town-square beer-soaked muppets were seen heading to the pub in their droves last night with 20 minutes to go! And a lot of them don’t do much for Irish soccer by staying at home watching Sky and ignoring their own league which provided half the bloody team last night. The best fans in the world stick around til at least the 85th minute  or into injury time – unless you truly believe your early absence will cause a much needed change like the walkout at the 6-1 loss to Germany eventually led to end of Trap’s reign. And the best fans in the world support their local clubs – the next James, Seamus, Daryl, Seanie etc. etc. The only saving grace from last night is we will be spared the incessant feed of “look what the Irish lads have done now” nonsense being force-fed to us by the balls.ie and sports joe brigade next summer as the 5th gas-ticket eejit of the day stares out from our screens, a red cheeked, sweaty, grinning gom with his viral antic of the day.

Oh I’ve enjoyed my travels as an Irish fan, don’t get me wrong. But being great is one thing. Being 100% aware of it, and doing all you can to record and share with the world how great you are is a whole different thing.

4. Grassroots and the League of Ireland

We don’t know how the significant changes to the structure of schoolboy football, controversial as it was, will work out. Ireland has always had a massive number of soccer players, all plying their trade for their local clubs or one of the big teams, primarily in Dublin – St. Josephs, Home Farm, Kevins, Belvo, Cherry Orchard, Lourdes etc., but with no link to the League Of Ireland, and with their eyes on England. This is changing now and should provide a pathway from schoolboy into a domestic top-level and to establish a unified approach to the game in Ireland, as the route to top-level in England seems less and less likely to provide a career as time goes on. We’ll wait and see how these national leagues pan out. It’ll be a few years before it bears fruit, but change was needed.

5. England and the Premier League

Irish football is unique geographically in Europe, but also as a sport in Ireland. It sits in the immediate shadow of the biggest sporting empire in history  – the English Premier League. The impact of this behemoth on the England team has been evident for a long time, as chances for English players at the highest level evaporate, but for the likes of the Irish, Welsh and Scottish, it has destroyed them, and related to point 1, it’s impossible to tell how much worse this Irish group is to those that played pre-Sky and pre-globalisation of the English game.

We need to somehow make that irrelevant. We need another pathway to get our lads playing in top-division winning teams; in the Champions League; and in the Europa League. Yes some have gotten more experience doing that by staying in the League of Ireland, but they also need to meet better players on a regular basis. From a purely footballing perspective every other league in Europe is a better option for a young Irish player than England in my view, yes even La Liga and the Bundesliga – not every team is Barcelona or Bayern, but we seem wedded to the familiar culture, and more importantly to the money it pays. The game as it is played and run in England is no good to us.

6. The “Irish” Way

What typifies Irish football? Who symbolises the Boys in Green in your mind? Who has provided the great, great moments of our football history. A football fan from abroad may conjure up some sort of Niall Quinn / Daryl Murphy hybrid. But nothing could be further from the truth. Ireland’s best players throughout the post-war era have been relatively small in stature and massively talented footballers. Giles, Brady, Whelan, Roy and Robbie Keane, Damien Duff. Add in the likes of Ray Houghton, Kevin Sheedy, Tony Galvin and then consider Robbie Brady, Hoolahan, even Hendrick at his best last year. Matt Holland and Mark Kinsella back in 2002 as well. Only McCarthy and Kerr seem to have understood this since the 1980’s.

These players represent the Irish way, not some horseshit about spirit and determination. We have no monopoly on that and to suggest otherwise is offensive to the rest of the world! If you watched the John Giles documentary, you would’ve heard this, and also Michael Walker alluded to it recently on Second Captains. Little dancers, the street footballers of Dunphy’s rants. He’s right. He’s absolutely right. Wes Hoolahan has had a phenomenal career. Dozens of former internationals would have given their right arm to have played and scored in a major tournament for Ireland, and had such a life in football as he has. Yet he was wasted in England and wasted by two Irish managers, O’Neill much less so, however Trap’s ignorance was a treachery of Irish football. We will make more players like Wes. There have been signs that Horgan, O’Dowda and Maguire could develop into important internationals. But my fear is that the English way – particularly in the Championship or at a battling Premier League team playing Samball and Pulisball – will compromise them. Maybe a few years in the Eredivisie or somewhere would do them no harm.

We need to re-establish that Irish way, and this is linked to all of the above points. It’s our football culture and only we the fans can do it. Sure we can curse and swear about the FAI and John Delaney, but they’re not erecting barriers outside Dalymount and Tallaght to stop you getting in. There are solutions and all is far from lost.

Real football is over for the time being, but it will be back…

The prevailing feeling and mood pushed by the English media – and one which has oozed into the hearts and minds of some Irish football fans – is that international football is rubbish and that the Premier League is the only show in town. People who think this way deserve no little opprobrium, but are probably more worthy of pity. They are missing out. They are missing out on one of the fundamentals of the game of football. Dunphy said it years ago – without international football there is no football. And in this small country of ours, where all of our best players play abroad, it holds a truly special place.

Our cultural and social history can be charted against the fate of our national football team – pre and post-Italia 90 – a grim old nation held its breath and gave way to a shiny new one; Saipan as a barometer of the ‘sure it’ll be grand’ brigade versus those who wanted more, who wanted perfection and to throw off the old Irish way of thinking; and Trappatoni’s Ireland as a symbol of the Troika, as the Germans came and pillaged 6-1 and €64 billion. Some of us measure Ireland the country by Ireland the football team (Some of us are daft!). The brand and quality on show is irrelevant. Real football is whatever you want it to be. It’s the football that brings you to your feet; that renders you helpless to that overwhelming urge to scream with both joy and rage. It’s the football that truly matters. And it’s back.

With that in mind, this momentous week begins. And it began with the news that Seanie Maguire will miss the play-off against Denmark. Yet another product of the domestic game who has risen to represent a new hope for our national team, this time where it’s desperately needed – up front. His goal against Brentford – with their 2 Danish defenders – last week was a bit special. But a hamstring tear in training has robbed us of his services. And has robbed him of a genuine chance to shine, but injuries have also robbed Denmark of the 2 defenders he scored against. He joins a long list of Irish casualties including Coleman of course, McCarthy, Walters and Keogh. Hendrick and Ward are also a worry. It’s half the bloody team and we’re looking very, very light up top.

But as we know, to the extent that it’s become a cliché, this team rises to the big occasions. Germany, Italy and Wales (the latter a big scalp since summer 2016) have all been done over by O’Neill’s team and we have no reason to believe they can’t do it to the Danes as well. It will be a tough 180 minutes, with very little between the teams. The strange over-confidence displayed after the draw will seem misplaced after about 5 minutes on Saturday. I really found that a strange reaction – drawing the lowest ranked first seed is not the same as getting an easy draw. They are a better team than us. Full stop. It will be extremely difficult. They have a trophy in their cabinet and no matter how long ago that was, it speaks to the strength of their football culture – a key factor in how nations approach games and tournaments. If we come back with a draw or a 1-goal defeat, I won’t be too disappointed. If we get an away goal in either of those scenarios, I’ll be bloody delighted.

On the other extreme of this confidence are those that are petrified by Christian Eriksen. As one of the form players in the Premier League for one of its best sides, he is certainly more than worthy of our close attention, but let’s not fool ourselves into thinking he will dictate the game, or run the show. He is not at that level and by focussing too much on him, we may forget others. Like Nicklas Clownshoes Bendtner. He hardly shone in his last outing on Irish soil, where his Rosenborg drew with Dundalk in a Champions League qualifier, but he now has 18 goals in 29 games, has just won the Norwegian title and is still the right side of 30. Forget the novelty boxers, he seems to mean business now.

This team have a lot of experience all over the pitch, but they’re hardly world beaters. It may take something special to beat Kasper Schmeichel however, and I’m sure his father has inspired him to seek revenge for November 1993. It was on that momentous night that he was sent up to the box for a corner in a desperate last-minute attempt to force one in against Spain in the last round of World Cup Qualifiers. A goal would have sent the then European Champions into 2nd place in our group and beyond us into USA ’94. He failed. And we had a bit of a hooley Stateside whacking the Italians before limping out in the second round. I won a pound in a poetry contest in school that week for a short poem about the last few minutes of that Denmark v Spain game. An Irish poetry contest no less! Go hiontach I was.

Elsewhere, let’s keep an eye out for the other M. O’Neill as Northern Ireland take on the Swiss. I’ve no love for Switzerland as a footballing country. They reek of ‘meh’, with their crafty but dull methods of fluffing up their ranking and seeding. They have never been exciting and a World Cup would be better off with our neighbours than that lot. I fancy the Nordies because Michael O’Neill appears to be some class of footballing wizard, whose departure from Tallaght is still felt.

Croatia will beat Greece I hope, and Italy will be made work by Sweden but will overcome them. Also Honduras play Australia and Peru play New Zealand. I’m gonna go with the 2 from the Americas on that one, purely because New Zealand banned foreign workers from buying houses and some Aussie MP slagged off the Irish. So fuck em both! Plus that Peru jersey is a classic (sorry to go a bit balls.ie here).

It all kicks off in Belfast and Zagreb on Thursday. Enjoy those games and Friday’s. Get through Saturday and you never know what Tuesday will bring. It’s been 15 years since Japan and Korea. Almost a generation since we last played in a World Cup. We deserve one now, particularly having been robbed once since then – come on, whose mind hasn’t drifted back to that poxy night in Paris in the past few weeks! I have a good feeling about this. I trust Martin O’Neill in this position. And moreover I trust this group of players.

Real football is back!!!

 

“Jaxon Lal had been headhunted by Manchester City scouts after his mother posted a video on Facebook of him playing football in the garden. The accompanying photo (in the Manchester Evening News article) showed him posing… in a Barcelona kit. Messi’s name was on the back of his ludicrously over-sized shirt. Jaxon Lal was 3 years old.”

This quote from Michael Calvin’s comprehensive, and at times disturbing, exposé of the UK’s football academy system is one of the more shocking instances of how very, very young boys are being abused by football. A 3 year old is a wholly inappropriate subject of a football club’s interest. All this mother did was put a video on facebook, more than likely for friends and family to see. Doing a newspaper article probably was more than misguided, but for Man City to go after him is absolutely vile. I don’t know what’s happened since, but the stories are all still online for you to see. I presume he’s off the stabilisers now and  ready for big school. I hope to god he manages to have a childhood. So many hundreds, thousands maybe, lost theirs to the voracious nature of the football industry in the UK.

No Hunger In Paradise is the final instalment in Calvin’s acclaimed trilogy looking under the bonnet of the sanitised product we are fed on an hourly basis by Sky, BT and the football print media. I have yet to read “The Nowhere Men” about scouts, but it was The Times book of the year for 2014. “Living On The Volcano” dug deep behind the veneers of football managers – an eye-opener on the daily struggles, and mental anguish some suffer. At all levels in the professional game.

But “No Hunger In Paradise” is different. This book is about the kids. It charts numerous examples of children being brought into a system which promises the world. Where parents, often in pretty dreadful situations, aching for a way out of the lives they’ve led, and lives they pray their children never have, are strung along out of sheer desperation.

If the Preface doesn’t make you queasy about the game we love, then you’re not of a right mind. A litany of appalling cases set you up for a depressing journey, summed up as follows:

“This is a world of fear and loathing, where unprincipled agents stalk pre-teen players on social media, and circulate in training grounds, surreptitiously offering boys cinema tickets as tainted tokens of their esteem. Some have been smuggled through security checks by complicit parents. To quote a principled specialist in youth recruitment, who is appalled by the scramble to secure players as young as 6 on pre-agreement contracts – ‘everyone wants a new toy’ “

A fitting analogy. A football is a toy to a 6 year old. It should remain a toy for some years after. But Calvin shows how far from reality this is. It’s not all bad news obviously. The unscrupulous agents and greedy clubs are offset by some spectacular work being done in communities by many people. It is these people who provide the uplifting and inspiring parts of this book. Former gang-member Scott Steadman’s Afewee project in Brixton is one such example, taking Nathaniel Clyne from the “Gun City” block of flats to Liverpool Football Club; but more importantly taking dozens of kids every night out of those lawless violent environments into a disciplined football environment. It is a community service.

Serving the club, however, is what drives most of those operating in academies, and serving one’s self is what drives many agents. Enlightenment is coming, but slowly. When certain agents and academy directors meet some parents – when avarice and callousness meet desperation – things can still unravel. Teenage boys let go after 10 years in an academy because they have developed bad habits. Academies shut down for financial reasons having just offered a load of new contracts. Timing and luck playing as much a role in your child’s future as talent, hard work and good parenting.

Michael Calvin has done all football fans a massive favour with this book. For Irish kids, the road is probably less treacherous in that there is less chance they will be snapped up as children or pre-teens and sent through the academy machine to be spat back out, although I don’t know for sure, but it’s still a lesson in how to make a boy go from a wide-eyed innocent child kicking a toy ball around the house to a bitterly disappointed and heartbroken teenager in the blink of an eye. Because this book teaches that above all else. They only get one childhood and it flies past. It will also have enough disappointments anyway (because no kid can have everything) without exposing them so completely to this behemoth of an industry. An industry which you must remember is ok with pummelling children with ads for that most ravenous habit; an industry that still cannot deal with homosexuality; one that still treats women as second class citizens; and remains happy to feed itself off moronic banter, jingoism, and lad culture way, way beyond it’s sell-by date.

Football may be the greatest game on earth – by a long, long way – but like the music business, Hollywood and banking, the more we look under the bonnet the less we want to see. Michael Calvin opens our eyes to those stories and we owe him a massive debt of gratitude for that. A book that should be read by all football fans, and one that may change the game for the better.

 

The scenes over the weekend from Barcelona and other towns across Catalonia have thrown the territorial integrity of Spain into sharp focus. Barcelona playing behind closed doors was another signal, albeit more symbolic, of the chaos which has gripped the region, and the nation-state. In recent decades, “Mes Que Un Club” has never meant more. Gerard Pique’s incredible interview after the unrest was another sign of the strength and depth of feeling within football in relation to this issue. Those who don’t see the relevance of sport in political and social matters understand nothing. And they understand even less about Spain and Catalonia. This post cannot even begin to fully address an issue to which tomes have been dedicated over many years, but an overview is not beyond me.

The history behind the secession movement is a complicated one. Walk the streets of Barcelona, Girona or Tarragona, and you would be forgiven for believing that the status quo has served Catalans well. Spain’s GDP per capita was €24,000 in 2016, Catalonia’s was just under €30,000. This is a case of the haves wanting to have a little bit more, or at least be compelled to give away a little less. One of the catch-crys of the movements is “They are Robbing Us”. This is not a case of an oppressed minority screaming for independence from their colonial masters. Catalonia is not Ireland 1845. It’s not even Scotland 2014, where GDP per capita is lower than the UK and England. I acknowledge it’s only one measure, and an economic measure at that, but it does give context.

(Banner translates as “They Rob €60 Million a Day From Us, Independence is Necessary”. It may be true, or it may be as true as the £350 Million a week slogan from Brexit)

What measures like that don’t do is explain the emotional aspect of this debate. After the Civil War, the actions of Franco’s regime in the oppression of Catalan culture in the early years of his rule is critical to understanding the movement. All Catalan activities were effectively banned for decades. The institutions of Catalonia’s government were abolished. This was true cultural repression, but well before the General’s death in 1976, the restrictions were starting to be lifted, if not fully.

To understand football and Barcelona’s link to Catalan nationalism, one can go back to what Jimmy Burns in his brilliant Barca calls, as a chapter title, “Death in the Afternoon”. It tells the story of Josep Sunyol i Garriga, President of the Club who was executed without trial on August 6th 1936 by a Francoist soldier after his arrest. His legacy was one of controversy with his status downplayed for decades by the club out of a fear that they would be linked to left-wing republican separatism in a fascist and extremely unitary Spain under General Franco. They finally recognised him in 1996, on the 60th anniversary of his death, after a hard-hitting campaign by his advocates.

It is extremely naive, however, to believe that Real Madrid was simply Franco’s team and Barcelona some kind of plucky underdog of oppressed Catalans. Neither Castilla nor Catalonia were, or are, homogenous political entities. The weekends referendum results are meaningless, not only due to the low turnout, but also about who turned up. Independence is not a universal objective of all Catalans. Just like in Scotland. The Madridistas may have no time for Catalan independence, but don’t for one minute believe that they all advocate the shameful actions of the Spanish police. On the other side, don’t presume that all 90,000 in the Camp Nou every second weekend would go so far as to wish to secede from Spain.

In footballing terms, independence would be absolutely fascinating, but more than likely a very bad thing for all concerned. While 4 of the 6 former Yugoslav states have qualified for tournaments, with Croatia finishing 3rd in the 1998 World Cup, you cannot but feel that that team would have gone better. Similarly, what sort of team would Ireland have had in the mid 1980’s if we had been united. Catalonia, with a population of 7.5 million, and one of the greatest footballing institutions on earth, would of course be a force to be reckoned with. But if that great institution has no Real Madrid, no Valencia, or no Athletico Madrid to battle with week in week out, they could soon have a lot more than political separatism in common with Scotland. And any national team would suffer as well.

You may have sensed some degree of anti-separatism in this piece, and I think you’d be right. I absolutely adore Spain and Spanish culture, including everything Catalonia has to offer. I’ve been to the country and its islands close to a dozen times and each time I fall further in love with the people, the food, the architecture and the landscape. From the spectacular mountains of northern Tenerife to the tranquility of Port Lligat in Catalonia itself, Spain is my favourite country in Europe apart from my own. I would be disappointed to see Catalonia break away, and upset if it triggered the full break-up of the country. What the Spanish Government and its security forces did over the weekend was unforgivable. All they had to do was to sit back and let them vote and then refuse to recognise it. What was a peaceful show of democracy turned into a shameful violent repression seen all over the world, but that bull-headed ignorance from the capital should not be seen as a representation of the Spanish people and Spanish society.

I hope I see a united Spain in Russia next summer. I hope Gerard Pique is playing. Spain has defined our footballing generation with some of the greatest performances of all time from its clubs and its national team. There are other routes to self-governance apart from independence. Politicians need to sit down and offer one of these routes to the Catalan people. Then, and only then, if the status quo becomes untenable, should Madrid offer a legal and binding referendum. And if we end up with Barcelona and Espanyol outside La Liga, so be it. “Mes Que un Club” may then have to be extended with the words ” Un País També”. More than a Club, A Country as Well.

1.  Glenn Whelan has been a good servant. As Roy Keane so eloquently put it, he always shows up. His statement reminded me of a Billy Connolly sketch about his school report, which read “Billy is always punctual”. It’s what they don’t say that matters and when your assistant manager neglects to talk about your ability to play the game you’re playing, well forget it. It’s time Ireland moved on, but moved on with nothing but gratitude. He has 277 Premier League appearances for a reason. He does the dirty things well apparently, but as we saw on Tuesday, we have others who can do that and do it better. And we’ve had one of them for a long, long time…
2. Wes. I don’t care if, when he turns 40 in 2022, we’re dragging him to Qatar to play for only the last 20 minutes in the final group game where we need a win, he has to be on that plane. He was simply superb in the first half and against 90% of teams, his contribution would’ve been enough to help us into a decent lead. And this is the biggest lesson for me from the 2 games and something I’ve been on about a few times in the Beggar’s Bush after a few – Wes does the dirty things better than Glenn Whelan, PLUS he follows it up with something beautiful almost every time. He won the ball back from the Serbians several times in the first half and then made something of it. He was immense and he made everyone else look better. He needs to start every single game for the rest of his Ireland career and only be taken off when he’s absolutely banjaxed. And by the way, Robbie Savage you silly tart, his omission at Norwich says more about them and the lumpen English football culture that Wes, and almost all Irish players, find themselves in, than it does about this little dancer.
3. Serbia are fairly handy. We played well but the way Kolarov took that goal; the way they defended; and the cynical time-wasting all point to a well-organised group who seem ready to finally push on and do something in a World Cup. Worthy winners of the group and certainly a notch above the rest of us, Wales included.
4. God we really missed Séamus Coleman. I was extremely miffed to hear and overhear many people on Tuesday night laud Cyrus Christie’s performance. He offered a bit in defence, but several dangerous plays still came down his side – can’t really blame him for the goal however even though it was on our right. But it was in his attack where he was getting the credit. Why? His delivery was shite, his decision-making in the last 20 minutes brutal, and his overall quality on the ball was just ok. But it was Coleman’s leadership that was most notable by its absence. There’ll be many scapegoats if, as is likely, we fail to qualify, but Neil Taylor will be near the top of my list. 
5. James McClean. What the fuck does he actually achieve? People love him. They adore him. They cheer mindless cheers at every mindless tackle. This isn’t the 1970’s. No one gets anything in modern football without calmness, composure and thoughtfulness. You don’t even have to look to another team or back into the annals of history to see the contrast in what we desperately needed on Tuesday and what we got. Just think of Lille last year. Desperate for a win, Wes missed a sitter. Within a couple of minutes, he looked for the ball, received it,  looked up, composed himself and put it on Brady’s head. McClean would’ve probably hit my head, behind the goal above the corner flag. It’s too late for him to grow up. He’s got his uses, and his goal in Austria should still be counting towards a first place finish, but I’m sick to death of his mindlessness. The booking was inevitable and it even looked like a red could happen. He’s worth a starting place, but only just. And I do hope he scores 4 in the next 2 and I’m back on here in October writing a humble apology to you all! Because I’m not a miserable bastard and I fucking love him too!!
6. We need our manager to cop on. His on-going snottiness to Tony O’Donoghue under innocuous and reasonable questioning has grown very tiring. We were dirt, absolute dirt on Saturday and Martin O’Neill picked the wrong team and failed to make the necessary changes. And Martin, like it or not, you’re answerable to us the fans, and the medium for that exchange is RTÉ. And stop telling us that the team is not that good. I bristled a couple of years back when Dunphy labelled O’Neill as “Trappatoni with a Derry accent”. On Saturday evening, I was tending to agree. By Tuesday night, less so, but remember, remember, we got to Euro 2016 by finishing 3rd in our group, a luxury unavailable to any previous Irish manager, we also got out of the group over there in 3rd place, a luxury only available to Jack Charlton twice and used just once. O’Neill’s Ireland have provided some magnificent moments that will live long in the memory, but let’s not pretend he’s achieved or is achieving much more than his predecessors.
7. It’s time to gamble up front and Sean Maguire has to feature in the last 2 games. Shane Long, like McGeady and McClean, has come to the end of that “promising” part of his career. Germany aside he really hasn’t delivered to the extent required. 17 goals may put him up alongside the likes of Frank Stapleton, Don Givens et al, but he really isn’t and the lack of a killer instinct is now beginning to show. Maguire seems to be blessed with that, and while he’s at it, O’Neill should be willing to give Daryl Horgan time against Moldova. We need a fresh injection of some energy and even some youthful naivete to boost the team and the fans and get us to 2nd place.

So 2nd place, what seemed at the start of the year to be unlikely as we sat on top with 4 points from 6 from the 2 trickiest away games, is now unlikely as we sit in 3rd with 1 from 6 from 2 games we hoped to win. A poxy week for Irish football but as usual the hope is still there, waiting to kick us in the nads next month. Enjoy the FAI Cup games at the weekend and the return of the richest league in the world across the water. Keep an eye out for the bottom 16 and the Championship though to track our lads progress….

It won’t be enjoyable. None of it will. The 180 minutes plus injury time will be an ordeal for us to sit through. Saturday will be a particular brand of footballing nightmare. If you’re at home watching it, I recommend a drink. If you’re in the pub, several. Because Georgia owe us a beating. They really do. I said immediately when the fixtures came out that our campaign would be determined in no small measure by the game in Tbilisi – in that hulk of KGB-sponsored sporting expression of Soviet ideals formerly named after Vladimir Ilych Lenin. The independent state of Georgia may have experienced few great international football days and nights, but this ground has history and heritage. This is a lions’ den which once saw Liverpool – a mighty Liverpool – savaged 3-0 in front of 110,000 people in 1979. This was enough to see Dinamo into the European Cup quarter-final. The locals here have form.

And this form can take a sinister turn, as Brian Kerr’s Ireland found out in 2003 when Kevin Kilbane was struck by the blunt side of a pen-knife, Lee Carsley and Damien Duff hit by plastic bottles and Gary Breen by a ball-bearing. All this while Shay Given’s goal had glasses smashed against it. A hostile crowd, you might say.

We’ve been back just the once since, although we’ve fulfilled two away fixtures against them. The first was a 2-1 win in Mainz, Germany which was moved due to a recent war in Georgia itself. In better circumstances, a most valuable 3 points started us on the road to France with 2 Aiden McGeady crackers in September 2014. Overall our competitive record is as follows:

P7 W7 D0 L0 F12 A4

Sure that’s grand so. A 100% record, including all 3 away games. But every away game was won 2-1, and a last minute goal was needed in 2014. We’ve also scraped through some of the home games, with a still inexplicable penalty required in Croker to draw level late on, and a 79th minute winner following, both from Robbie Keane back in 2009. And the less said about Séamus Coleman’s fairly fortunate winning goal last October in Lansdowne the better! So we’ve rode our luck in our games against Georgia. But not only that, Georgia also did us an almighty favour by beating Scotland in the last campaign. So we’ve rode our luck even in games we’re not playing! Only in 1 of those 7 wins were we victorious by more than 1 goal, and that was 14 years ago. This will be a grind, and an absolutely dreadful 1 goal victory would be grabbed with both hands if offered now.

And then it’s Serbia at home. We’ve served up some pox in Lansdowne over recent years and have yet to put away any rivals under O’Neill. The mania of the German victory stands in stark, stark contrast to absolutely everything else. Including the Euro 2012 qualifiers up to now, Poland, Scotland, Austria, Sweden, Russia and Slovakia have all taken points from Lansdowne Road, some even took 3. Not only was the German victory our first over one of the big boys for over a decade, it’s also the only decent home victory of any sort in a qualifier since the Dutch came to town in 2001, unless you count the Welsh and Slovak teams that Staunton’s Ireland overcame in the Euro 2008 campaign, teams we didn’t regard as real rivals at the time! It’s been grim stuff which has me now questioning that recent season ticket renewal. I’m sure I’ll be questioning it further as I sit head in hands in Block 519 for a good chunk of Tuesday night.

So expect nothing. Have a good few nights of football though. It’s not about the performance. It never is. Only the results matter and I firmly believe this group is the most capable of delivery we’ve had in a long, long time. They delivered in Vienna and to a lesser extent in Belgrade. If we get 3 on Saturday, the momentum is maintained and could see us past Serbia as well. We could do with making Cardiff in October and games involving other teams irrelevant and 2 victories will do that, with 3 points at home to Moldova a given, also in October.

So YoG is extremely optimistic that we will get the results. But I won’t enjoy any of it! Which in itself is a wonderful and gloriously satisfying state for an Irish football fan.

This series of “Great Days and Nights in Ireland” was intended to inspire people to get up off their arses and head down to their local club some night by showing how good it could be, especially those magical European nights. But given the week that we are in, and in particular given the response to Dundalk’s fantastic run last season, let’s have a look at the night in Serbia that first brought an Irish club to that next level – a place in the group stages of a European competition.

The first leg in Tallaght did not go particularly well with Rovers needing a late Gary McCabe equaliser to peg Partizan at 1-1. I’ve little memories of the match other than the usual technical ability of the opposition, but while it was a late goal, a defeat would never have been a fair outcome here.

Onto Belgrade and it seemed unlikely that Rovers could take that next step. Partizan’s resources would surely show. And Volkov got the breakthrough for the Serbs on 35 minutes with a header. Nothing so far had given any indication that Rovers would bounce back in the manner they did. And then after the break, one of the finest goals in Irish UEFA history – in terms of quality yes but moreso because of what it meant – was slammed in by Pat Sullivan, etching his name forever into Rovers folklore.

It was one of those ‘jump out of your seat’ moments. I was in Devitt’s pub on Camden Street, a fine pub you’ll agree, although I haven’t been in since its recent makeover. I, being a very pushy Hoop, had managed to drag a few football loving mates out, including one Bohs fan and also a friend who was home for a few weeks from New Zealand. And when this hit the back of the net, the lot of us erupted, even the Bohs fan who quickly realised her heresy and sat back down politely. Another friend was listening to Off the Ball on Newstalk at the time at home and immediately grabbed his bike and crossed town to meet us to see the rest of the match. (Ah the days of midweek scoops, living in town, no kids…)

More drink was taken. By extra-time it was getting a bit blurry. And then, believe it or not, our fine pub turned into a trad session. Now I know the place well on the Friday nights when they have the sessions upstairs, but this was Thursday and they were having it downstairs. For fucks sake. The TV is muted, and we have to hush for the ballads. Ah Jaysus….

Extra time. A young lady starts sweetly singing alone in the corner. A hush descends on the pub. A few Americans are loving this wonderful picture postcard view of Ireland while the rest of us respect the moment. “FUCKING PENALTYYYYYYY!!!!!”.  Sheppard is bundled over by the keeper. I get extremely animated and extremely stared-at. I do not care one iota. I like Devitt’s but I’ll risk a barring if they give me the next few minutes. Stephen O’Donnell slots it home. Again we erupt. The shakes then start and they last right up to the final whistle. I struggle outside to light my cigarette. I text the friends who couldn’t make it – “the domestic game’s Italia 90” I write with unfettered hyperbole. Screw it. We’re there. An incredible night. Eventually I calm down after one or two more pints – beautiful, wonderful pints – you know the ones – the post-match ones where you’re bloody parched and your heart is still jumping out of your chest. You take a deep breath and you start to imagine what’s to come and where will this take us…

Then in the group stages there was Ricer in White Hart Lane. For just a few minutes anything was possible…

Good luck to all the Irish teams in Europe this week. We should, all of us, put the weekly rivalries to one side and support whoever is playing and keeping the flag flying across the continent. I love this part of the season. I love the fact that not even one month on from the Ronaldo and Bale megastar show in Cardiff where the weekly wage bill could buy and sell the entire leagues of some of this weeks competitors, some remote outpost in the north Atlantic will host my team from Tallaght and that Derry, a city of 90,000 will send a team to Herning, a town of less than 50,000 in Jutland. As Alesandro Del Piero of Juventus said on his arrival in Tallaght for a Europa League game in 2010, this is pure football.

Thursday looks as follows:

Levadia Tallinn (EST) v Cork @ 16:30

Midtjylland (DEN) v Derry @ 19:00

Stjarnan (ICE) v Rovers @ 20:15

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Full highlights of the above game in Belgrade in what I presume is Serbian:

The relentless march of gambling, colonising every part of the game, every moment of every match, has corrupted football and has compromised its integrity in a way no other force has to date. And while it is doing this damage, it is also taking many of us for a ride. A ride in which you are simply robbed of your money. We know it’s a mugs game. We know there’s only ever one real winner. Yet many of us are still willing to risk everything. And that is what we are doing – we are risking everything. I say that simply because you never know when the buzz from a wee flutter will grow into an all-consuming addiction and a serious illness that affects you and everyone around you.

The facts are shocking. They are available from gambleaware.ie and include the following:

• Approximately 12% of Irish adults bet with a bookmaker weekly;
• Less than 1% of those who need treatment for problem gambling actually receive it;
• Irish people are estimated to gamble over €5bn per year; thats €14m per day or €10,000 per minute; and
• According to the Institute of Public Health in Ireland, adolescent gambling is thought to be 2-3 times the rate of adults.

5 Billion euros! That’s 7 or 8 National Children’s Hospitals, or Metro North plus DART Underground, countless schools, thousands of Gardaí, and tens of thousands of social housing units. (Unfortunately for this line of argument, it’s still only a fraction of the banking bailout, but moving on…) And you can be damn sure that a massive fraction of that €5bn is kept by the bookie. Pissed up the wall in other words. A pointless waste of money.  And according to Paul Rouse in the Irish Examiner last year, Ireland is said to have the highest gross gambling revenue by capita in Europe. That’s a lot of people wasting a lot of money.

Football has in recent years thrown its arms around this insidious industry, and has helped, via its slick and incessant marketing, to make it mainstream and perfectly acceptable. Paddy Power’s funny ads with the steward and the bus driver; Ray Winstone’s bloated cockernee face imploring us to “ave a bang on that” 4 times per ad break; in-game odds on the fucking advertising hoardings during a game – what tasteless bastard allowed that to become the norm? All of this serves to make it ok for us to throw €5bn into this industry. It makes it ok to whip out your smartphone on your barstool while your mates are looking the other way and spunk €20 on Coutinho to score next goal on B**V*****’s oh-so-easy to use app (the official betting partner of Liverpool FC) .

Or to do so on your couch, while your kids play on in the same room, oblivious to Daddy’s increasingly serious habit that may one day end up costing them something important. It may be a bit harsh to think of it in that way, but I’m sick to the back teeth of the direction in which my peers, my fellow fans, are bringing the game I love. Every conman needs a rube, and sports gambling has countless millions willing to blow their wages, wages their families may rely on, to feed the industry’s soulless ugly corporate black hearts. The vile takeover is almost complete. When gambling corporations and the global match-fixing networks have come to the League of Ireland, it’s almost all over.

But it’s not over. Not yet. And maybe a fightback can happen and football clubs will listen eventually. Half of last season’s premier league club shirts were sponsored by betting companies. That means that every week, millions of children were walking around towns and cities, into schools and playgrounds advertising an industry that leeches off the most vulnerable in our society. And that doesn’t account for the numerous clubs with “betting partners”. The need for “partners” in everything from tyres to hair products is another issue I have with the corporatisation of football, but y’know I don’t really mind Adam Lallana’s baby’s-arsed complexion popping up in the ad break, because I need shaving gel regularly enough, so it’s ok. Plus I’ve never heard of a marriage breaking up because the husband was over-moisturised. I do not need to muck a tenner on Liverpool to win 2-1 because Ray fucking Winstone shouted at me as I was coming back from the jacks!

I know the tone of this post won’t make Yard of Grass many friends. I know some of you will think it’s over the top and unfair on those who maybe spend a few quid a week here and there on the odd bet. But their casual acceptance of gambling into their lives means that it will continue to grow and continue to snare the addictive personalities. This could mean that your mate of 30 years who’s by your side in the pub, in Tallaght, Dalymount or Lansdowne Road for every match, falls victim to this vicious habit.

I do not think that it is a step too far to say that every one of us knows someone who could end up being that victim. I don’t know anything about the psychology of an addictive personality but we all know the one who 20 years ago obsessed with his fantasy football league team and maybe still does; the one who knew the word to every single Oasis song ever recorded, even all the shit B-Sides; the one who drank everything in his 20’s and did all the drugs all the time. He stopped doing the real drugs, but every time he watches a match now he is being very cleverly massaged into thinking that the latest drug is 100% socially acceptable and sure y’know, everyone does it anyway. Maybe watch out for that one if he starts betting.

There have been better articles on this topic, most notably on Football 365 earlier this year. If enough journalists and enough fans take notice of what is going on and kick against this trend, the clubs and the associations will eventually listen. This could be a phase and we may be looking back in 10 years at this period as a commercial and moral aberration. When I was a kid growing up in the 80’s, the greatest threat to football was hooliganism. Grounds, particularly in England, were not safe places. You wouldn’t bring women and children in. That changed radically – inside the grounds at least – because it was compromising the sport. Today the slick multi-billion corporate behemoth that is the betting industry, in my view, is the greatest threat to football. Our game is not horse racing or dog racing. It’s a much more important social and cultural phenomenon and I believe it needs to drag itself out of this cesspool.

 

I’ll leave you with a quote from the referenced Football 365 article written by John Nicholson, which is itself harsh, but worth reflecting on as you trawl for events to gamble on over the summer:

“When the fun stops, stop? Well, the fun has stopped, but there seems no stopping the takeover of football by the gambling industry, and that’s to the benefit of no-one except those who feast on the profits it carves out of its low rent, shallow, debased culture, and still, more importantly, carves mercilessly out of human misery.”

Once again, thanks for reading and please click on the links below.

Recognise the problem

The Rutland Centre