Euro2012

Passion went missing Republic’s ‘pointless’ show at #Euro2012…

| Readers 57

Managerialism. That’s what they call it. Shuffling the deck chairs with little or no point or sense of long term value other than to perform a job. Call me, generally, neutral on the FAI/IFA thing, but last night missed the passion for the green shirt shown in former days by Gerry Armstrong, Sammy Mc, Niall Quinn and even that old fake Irishman Tony Cascarino. There wasn’t even trace of Jack’s much derided route one to goal. Trap’s game plan was …

Read more…

On Monday remember Loughinisland and all those killed on June 18th…

| Readers 118

Trevor Ringland has a letter in today’s Irish Times: In common with many others on this island, I remember well June 18th, 1994. The Republic of Ireland’s win over Italy in the World Cup was fantastic and gave all of us a tremendous boost. All of us that is, except those who walked into the Heights Bar in Loughinisland and sprayed it with bullets killing six people and seriously wounding five others. As news of this terrible atrocity filtered out, …

Read more…

After #Euro2012 is it time to think about a single Ireland soccer team?

| Readers 138

Well, as it was put on Morning Ireland this morning the Republic sang whilst Spain played football. The singing, whilst impressive, only annoyed Roy Keane the more. The Corkman was blunt: “We’re a small country, we’re up against it, but let’s not just go along for the sing-song every now and again.” Translated, this roughly means: “this is sport, not entertainment”. I’m sure my old Da, who never even saw Keane the elder play but who loved seriously competitive players …

Read more…

Northern FAI fans turn up in Kracow (450kms from Poznan) to chant abuse at England team

| Readers 76

This is the footage from Poland of Ireland fans chatting “England’s going home…’ that features in a News Letter piece today asking why when Northern Ireland or Ranger’s fans go off the piste it is never given a ‘bye ball’ by the media at large in the way this story appears to have been… It also mentions this bizarre little episode: It’s hard to be definitive but the accent that most predominates of those who went to the considerable trouble …

Read more…

#Euro2012: Republic’s luck runs out in their return to tournament football?

| Readers 38

Old Trap’s Italian defensive approach to game ran out of luck last night… Not least because the one man you would expect to have kept it tight at the back was twice opened wide by fairly ordinary attacks. Can’t help thinking that some of the down reaction is a general underestimation of the Croatian team (who are ranked 8th in the world). Losing the first game is not the end of the affair, but conceding three goals may be too …

Read more…