No way are the Irish poles apart from Fifa whipping boys
■ Watching the World Cup matches makes me think that there must be something wrong with Fifa’s qualifying system if teams as weak as Saudi Arabia and Panama are playing in Russia while teams like Ireland or Italy are missing.
Having been deprived of the opportunity to watch the Boys In Green, I looked at the history of all Irish friendlies and was amazed to find out that, throughout the years, the team that Ireland played most frequently in friendly matches was Poland – starting with the 1938 friendly match in Warsaw and the rematch in Dublin (surprisingly, some footage from both matches survived).
I also noticed that, historically, Ireland performed much better at home than abroad. While this is true for all national teams, in Ireland’s case it is particularly striking; ie in 1938, Ireland lost 6-0 in Warsaw but won 3-2 in Dublin; they lost 3-1 in Kraków in 1964 but won the rematch in Dublin (3-2). In 1973, they lost 2-0 in Wroclaw but won 1-0 in Dublin (beating a Poland team that prevented England from qualifying for the 1974 World Cup and then beat Argentina, Italy, and Brazil in that World Cup).
Perhaps if Ireland organised the Fifa World Cup, it would be a golden opportunity to build Ireland’s national team as great as Charlton’s – and what a giant leap towards the reunification of the island of Ireland would it be if the Republic of Ireland organised it together with Northern Ireland.
Grzegorz Kolodziej Bray, Co Wicklow