Fans urged not to tarnish hard-earned reputation
NORTHERN Ireland fans’ chief Gary McAllister has urged supporters not to harm their reputation of being great ambassadors for their country tonight.
The spotlight will be on the fans when Northern Ireland take on the Republic in tonight’s friendly at the Aviva Stadium.
A little more than 2,000 away fans will attend the fixture and McAllister, spokesperson for the Amalgamation of Official Northern Ireland Supporters’ Clubs, expects them to contribute to a fantastic atmosphere.
“I’ve always been proud of the fact that Northern Ireland fans have been able to travel across the world and been great ambassadors for our country,” said McAllister. “We have won friends and let people see how friendly we are. I can tell numerous stories of how well we have been received in numerous countries from Turkey in 1998 through to Sarajevo last month, and countless places in between where the local authorities have praised us for our behaviour.
“I would ask people to bear that in mind. Yes, it is a derby game, and yes we want to win the game, but we have worked very hard to establish that reputation of good football fans over the last few decades and I would say to everyone to remember that because all eyes will be on the fans in this game.”
Supporters boycotted the last meeting in Dublin in May 2011 over the security arrangements.
“There were always going to be restrictions for the game, but our starting point was how we organised quite a successful boycott of the 2011 game,” added McAllister. “That was deemed to be a ‘bubble match’ when fans weren’t free to make their own travel arrangements, so we needed to ensure that fans were able to make their own way down to Dublin and either stay over or treat it as a normal away game.
“There has been a lot of discussion over a period of several months, and from our point of view it has been slightly frustrating because we would have liked the information put out there quicker, but we had to be patient and persevere.”
While the Irish FA and Football Association of Ireland have teamed up to launch a joint bid to host the Uefa Under-21 Championship in 2023, there appear to be no ongoing talks between the two bodies on the eligibility issue. Northern Ireland boss Michael O’Neill has raised concerns over the FAI’s targeting of young players and McAllister says the issue remains unresolved.
“The Court of Arbitration for Sport made the ruling years ago but we still feel the issue needs to be addressed in terms of compensation if one player has represented an association and then switched to another association. You could build into that a discussion about whether a player has not been selected for a number of years, but there does seem a lot of this happening with smaller nations putting resources into the development of a player only for him to switch to another nation.” • NORTHERN Ireland Under-19s were held 0-0 by Poland in their Euro qualifier at Shamrock Park yesterday.
They will face Serbia at The Oval on Saturday (7pm).