BEAUTIFUL GAME
FOOTBALL HAS BEEN PART OF MY LIFE FOR OVER HALF A CENTURY SAIPAN STANDS OUT FROM REST
(left) in Terenure worked with at the paper from my first freelance contributions have been magnificent: from the old Terenure tram shed to the nearby red brick HQ, from there to the glitzy Dundrum Centre and finally to Talbot Street, where the Irish Daily Star’s new hub will soon take shape.
Media
To my countless colleagues in the Irish football media, thanks for all those laughs, quotes we shared, taxi spins into the unknown outer suburbs in search of training grounds and meals and drinks we enjoyed.
Most of all, I must thank my wife Josephine (pictured) and daughter Kate for their patience and understanding of a job that refused to recognise usual working hours, most Sundays and long weekends.
HERE WE GO: Irish journalists in Izumo in 2002 Mick Scully, James Helm, David Walsh, Vincent Hogan, unidentified, Dave Kelly, Billy George, unidentified, Paul Lennon, Dion Fanning, Brendan Crossan, Colm Keys, Ciaran Doherty, Roy Curtis; Emmet Malone, Colin Young, Neil Silver, Philip Quinn, Andy Paton, Neil O’Riordan, Tony O’Donoghue, Paul Kimmage; (front): Dave Maher and Ivan Gaskell were often difficult, it was the complete opposite when dealing with managers and players at international and club level.
Official
YOU never forget your first football match, so the 1971 FAI Cup final between Drogheda and Limerick is indelibly printed on my mind.
Just short of eight years of age, the colour, noise, players, atmosphere and seductive clouds of cigarette smoke in the main stand at Dalymount Park remain vividly with me.
Unfortunately, Ronnie Whelan senior, Cecil Baxter, Mick Fairclough, Mick Cooke and Frank McEwan could not lift the Boynesiders’ first major trophy with Limerick triumphing 3-0 in the replay after a scoreless draw.
Seven years later I made my debut on the South Terrace at Lansdowne Road where Gerry Daly and Bob Latchford exchanged goals as Ireland and England shared the Euro 80 qualifying points.
The odour of alcohol now entered the mix as this sweaty mass of 15,000 souls swayed from side to side throughout the 90 minutes.
The Irish media flew with the official FAI party until 2012 and also billeted in the same hotels until 1997, giving journalists unbelievable access that would simply not happen today.
Interviews were conducted in hotel lobbies, beside airport luggage carousels and over late night pints with off-the-record titbits providing priceless background and back page stories.
Rumours nite club on O’Connell
Having worked in my native Drogheda for the Local News and then with the Meath Weekender in Navan, I began freelancing for the Sunday Tribune and Irish Daily Star in late 1989.
Initially, as a member of Jack’s Army I witnessed the glory of West Germany and Italia 90 before I succeeded my good friend Cathal Dervan in one of Ireland’s best journalism jobs in the summer of 1991, football correspondent with the Irish Daily Star.
Tournaments
I covered the World Cup tournaments in 1994 and 2002, the European Championships in 2012 and 2016 and well over 200 internationals involving the Boys In Green.
The League of Ireland was always my staple and, despite its problems, it is now entering a potentially very exciting
Street in Dublin — owned by the late Kris Naidoo, a massive football fan — had a strict policy in its VIP area: Irish players, their guests and reporters were only allowed behind the rope!
Big Jack’s modus operandi was simple. Over a cup of tea — or clutching a pint of Guinness if in the evening — and pulling from a cigarette traditionally provided by Charlie Stuart, the Ireland boss would openly discuss his thoughts off the record at the Clarion airport hotel following training.
His insights were invaluable and once used correctly, made everybody’s job much easier. Break his trust and he gave you a bollocking, phase of development.
It’s been one hell of a journey and one that I will always cherish and feel privileged to have been able to make.
My gratitude to the League of Ireland players, managers, coaches and officials will never fade for, without them, I and my colleagues could simply not be able to carry out our duties.
Thanks to one and all — not forgetting the referees!
The fans of the national teams and clubs were always happy to offer an opinion or share their stories. Again, huge gratitude to you.
To the cumulative hundreds of millions of readers who bought the Irish Daily Star since its inception in February, 1988, a heartfelt thanks many times over.
The colleagues whom I remaining suspicious of speaking in front of you again.
The Premier League clubs’ mission to control their players’ lives has made our jobs all the harder.
Reporters could once get into the players lounge at Old Trafford if they possessed the right ticket while access to the tunnel area was possible.
People
Now there’s often a wall of club PR people, advisers, agents and myriad others to negotiate with before you get to speak with a player.
Still, the joy of covering football games remains the same as it was three decades ago.
While interviews, previews, features, contracts, transfers, follow ups and footie politics are central to the job, it’s those 90 or 120 minutes and penalties that remain the most vital aspect of the trade.
And even with the introduction of VAR, the omnipresence of social media and saturation TV and radio coverage, the daily football reporter can still make a difference.
I’m off now to buy a packet of elastic bands.
Just in case. (all at the back)
THE biggest and most enthralling story I covered for the Irish Daily Star was Mick McCarthy and Roy Keane’s incredible showdown in Saipan in May 2002.
McCarthy had chosen the location for a week of combined training and RnR for his squad and staff before the intensive World Cup preparation began in Japan seven days before the opening game against Cameroon.
I’m not going to outline what happened again but the fact RTÉ will soon screen a documentary on the saga underlines its position as the greatest ever Irish sports story.
Hopefully those in charge speak to a few of the 20 or so journalists who witnessed what happened, unlike a British production some years ago that relied on second and third hand accounts.
Coaching
The Irish Daily Star recorded its largest ever sale of 121,000 copies the morning after Keane’s verbal assault on McCarthy in front of the playing, coaching and management staff after the manager challenged his skipper over a few issues.
How every daily paper in Ireland would love such figures two decades later, as the rise of online media and the exit of advertising to the online giants hollows out this fantastic but declining industry.
People still enquire of me as to who was at fault. Well, that’s easy.
McCarthy and Keane were both guilty of the wrong decisions at key moments but the FAI was equally at fault for failing to control and sort out what was a HR issue between its two most important employees.
Decades
Unfortunately, the other recurring theme for the past three decades has been the regular and spectacular crises in the FAI.
The seeds of the 1996 Merriongate episode were sown with the association’s ticketing policy during the 1994 World Cup in the USA.
Then-treasurer Joe Delaney would lose a vote of FAI council members on his membership of the board on a famous night in Dublin’s Westbury Hotel in 1996.
It’s now three years since his son John negotiated his exit from his role as executive vicepresident of the FAI following truly mindblowing financial and governance revelations about the association in his tenure as CEO.
That the FAI required a cash bailout from the Government, UEFA and Bank of Ireland to stay afloat must never be forgotten.
But the vast majority of those who serve in the FAI or work for it were — and are — dedicated to their sport while the tens of thousands of volunteers are motivated by a love of the game, club, country and community.