FAI History

byrner88

1965 - Ireland was in a play-off against Spain to qualify for the 1966 World Cup. The FAI agreed to play the game in Paris, where there would be more Spanish fans, if the FAI could have the Spanish share of the gate money. The Spanish agreed, and won the game.

1970s - The FAI regularly organised friendlies in Poland, where officials enjoyed the 'night life' (yes, that means pr**titutes), and once did not even stay in the same city as the match. The players travelled to one such game in the luggage carriage of a train, while the officials relaxed on seats.

1980 - After Johnny Giles quit, Eoin Hand beat Paddy Mulligan to the Ireland manager's job by one swing vote. Afterwards, one FAI board member said that he had voted for Hand because he thought Mulligan was the person who had thrown a bun at him on an away trip.

1986 - Jack Charlton became Ireland manager by accident, after the FAI messed up a vote intended to give the job to Bob Paisley. At first Charlton got only three votes out of eighteen, compared to nine for Paisley. The FAI then couldn't contact Charlton to tell him that he had got the job.

1986 - When a friend congratulated Charlton on his new job, he replied 'What job?' On being told he was Ireland manager, he replied 'Oh, I'd forgotten about that.' When Charlton sent his first squad list to the FAI, he found that an FAI official was adding players that he liked onto the list.

1994 - The FAI bought £296,000 of World Cup tickets, and gave most to a tout with the confidence-inspiring nickname of 'George the Greek', who unsurprisingly did a runner. The FAI ended up with a 'trading shortfall' of over £200,000, for which they obtained just 314 extra tickets for one Ireland match.

1996 - Two referees won a court case against the FAI after being downgraded for failing a new test. The judge called the FAI 'an autocracy which was incapable of abiding by its own rules'. The FAI quickly reacted by writing to 142 other referees, banning them all from refereeing for not taking the same test - the exact opposite of the court judgment.

1999 - The FAI announced a plan to spend £65m on a new stadium, but forgot to include the £16m cost of the site, then spent years debating which of two non-existent stadiums they would use. During the optimistic FAI bid to host Euro 2008, the UEFA panel was photographed examining an empty field.

2002 - The FAI prepared for the World Cup by forgetting to bring proper footballs to an island that had no proper football pitch, causing a minor civil war back home. On returning, the FAI ordered an independent investigation into itself, and pretty much ignored the results.


2002 - The FAI tried to sell TV rights for Ireland games to the subscription channel Sky. When the Government told them that EU law protects important cultural events for terrestrial TV viewers to watch free, the FAI countered that Irish football is not culturally important.

2005 - The FAI fired Brian Kerr, the only Irish manager to have won European and World trophies, and vowed to replace him with a World-class manager. This turned out to be Stephen Staunton, the part-time unofficial coach of the defenders at a poor English third division team.

2007 - The FAI has just fined two League of Ireland clubs EUR500 each because their fans were throwing paper. This comes after they introduced a revised promotion system for last season, which infuriated a Dundalk fan so much that he occupied their offices and doused himself with petrol.

Mr Magnolia

Nice post.

patmac

Should be on the Soccer Boards, quite depressing actually.

Green Giant

The sad part is that it's all true

Latchy

Very good thread and yes all true .I remember going to see ireland play at dalymount park when scoring a goal was a big occasion, never mind winning a match, or qualifying for any Finals

Latchy

byrner88 wrote: »

1965 - Ireland was in a play-off against Spain to qualify for the 1966 World Cup. The FAI agreed to play the game in Paris, where there would be more Spanish fans, if the FAI could have the Spanish share of the gate money. The Spanish agreed, and won the game.

I seem to recall that a draw in that match would have got the republic a place in the quater finals ?

1980 - After Johnny Giles quit, Eoin Hand beat Paddy Mulligan to the Ireland manager's job by one swing vote. Afterwards, one FAI board member said that he had voted for Hand because he thought Mulligan was the person who had thrown a bun at him on an away trip.

Eoin hand was a terribly unlucky manager with bad refereening keeping us out of several finals, his wife used to travel with the team to cook for them .......honestly

2005 - The FAI fired Brian Kerr, the only Irish manager to have won European and World trophies, and vowed to replace him with a World-class manager. This turned out to be Stephen Staunton, the part-time unofficial coach of the defenders at a poor English third division team.

I thought Brian Kerr was doing a fairly good job as manager and think the FAI should have stayed with him ,although some would never admit to it .

Pompey Magnus

FAI job vacancy details .

Latchy

Joe Kinnear's name has being thrown into the hat for the Job .I think he could be the man for the job ,he's a dub , played for ireland and he's a players manager (one of the lads) .Only concern might be his health problems of recent years, irish teams over the years have gave many heart palpetations .

Hagar

This is more soccer than Humour.
Thread moved. Soccer forum rules apply from here on.

d22ontour

byrner88 wrote: »

2002 - The FAI tried to sell TV rights for Ireland games to the subscription channel Sky. When the Government told them that EU law protects important cultural events for terrestrial TV viewers to watch free, the FAI countered that Irish football is not culturally important.

/sigh

shane86

latchyco wrote: »

I seem to recall that a draw in that match would have got the republic a place in the quater finals ?


.

Eh? It would have made us one of the 32 teams surely, having to reach the top 16 before the q final stage (or maybe there were less teams back then)

Where did you get all this info? Someone email Dunphy, id love to see him read this out

Pal

2002 The FAI commissioned an outside company called Genesis to advise them how to move the association forward. The report vindicated Roy Keane in Saipan and recommended reducing the number of FAI Council members. The FAI responded by sacking Genesis.

KdjaCL

The maxi situation needs more coverage.

2006 A dundalk fan whose team finished 2nd in Div 1 tried to burn down Merrion Square as galway were promoted after FAI officials were wowed by a powerpoint presentation of their financial plans made by Nick Leeson.


kdjac

Pighead

KdjaCL wrote: »

The maxi situation needs more coverage.

2006 A dundalk fan whose team finished 2nd in Div 1 tried to burn down Merrion Square as galway were promoted after FAI officials were wowed by a powerpoint presentation of their financial plans made by Nick Leeson.


kdjac

Not to mention the fact that the FAI made Dundalk play the promotion/relegation playoff against Waterford (which we won) even though they knew it was pointless.

Pal

KdjaCL wrote: »

The maxi situation needs more coverage.

2006 A dundalk fan whose team finished 2nd in Div 1 tried to burn down Merrion Square as galway were promoted after FAI officials were wowed by a powerpoint presentation of their financial plans made by Nick Leeson.


kdjac

Staggering.

But you have to admire Nick.

KdjaCL

Pighead wrote: »

Not to mention the fact that the FAI made Dundalk play the promotion/relegation playoff against Waterford (which we won) even though they knew it was pointless.

lol forgot about that


kdjac

GuanYin

I'm sure there are another 50 incidents we could add to that list.

Shane Long springs to mind.

_blank_

psi wrote: »

I'm sure there are another 50 incidents we could add to that list.

Shane Long springs to mind.

Are you referring to the incident recently where he was included when he was supposed to be suspended?

In fairness to the FAI, and I do not afford this lightly, they were told by UEFA that Long was ok to play.

As I already said, the rest of that list is absolutey farcial.

OhNoYouDidn't

Pighead wrote: »

Not to mention the fact that the FAI made Dundalk play the promotion/relegation playoff against Waterford (which we won) even though they knew it was pointless.

It wasn't pointless. The playoff was for who finished 11th and who finished 13th and there were points for the score involved. Or every season being counted had to be the same.

Everyone else understood that.

One of two things happened. a: Dundalk were chancing their arms or b: more plausibly, didn't understand/read what they signed up for and showed exactly the levels of rank amatuerism the FAI are trying to eliminate.

Another reason to keep them in the 1st where they belong.

Interesting list, if a little innaccurate in spots. No Milltown sale? :eek:

loyatemu

shane86 wrote: »

latchyco wrote: »

Eh? It would have made us one of the 32 teams surely, having to reach the top 16 before the q final stage (or maybe there were less teams back then)

Where did you get all this info? Someone email Dunphy, id love to see him read this out

the format has changed a lot over the years, the 32 team version only came in in (I think) 1998.

In 1966 qualifying group 9 consisted of Ireland, Spain.... and nobody else (Syria were in the group but subsequently withdrew)

We beat them in 1-0 Dublin, they beat us 4-1 in Seville, goal difference didn't count so there was a playoff in Paris

Check here for more details - http://www.rsssf.com/tablesw/worldcup.html

Prufrock

byrner88 wrote: »

1986 - Jack Charlton became Ireland manager by accident, after the FAI messed up a vote intended to give the job to Bob Paisley. At first Charlton got only three votes out of eighteen, compared to nine for Paisley. The FAI then couldn't contact Charlton to tell him that he had got the job.

1986 - When a friend congratulated Charlton on his new job, he replied 'What job?' On being told he was Ireland manager, he replied 'Oh, I'd forgotten about that.' When Charlton sent his first squad list to the FAI, he found that an FAI official was adding players that he liked onto the list.

I remember watching an interview about this. Charlton's reaction is great. "What job"? What a joke the FAI are. How can their organisational skills be so poor? How is it possible? :mad:

Pal

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football_Association_of_Ireland

somebody added it to Wikipedia.
guess it will stay too since its a fact

Pigman II

2008 - FAI appoint Graeme Souness.

BaZmO*

latchyco wrote: »

Eoin hand was a terribly unlucky manager with bad refereening keeping us out of several finals, his wife used to travel with the team to cook for them .......honestly

Apparently the reason for them bringing his wife to cook for the players was because on away trips to countries in far off Eastern Europe, the former USSR in particular, players were getting bad bouts of the trots from eating the foreign food. His wife offered to cook for them and and the FAI agreed. :rolleyes:

What was the story about the players having to do the Harry Ramsdens challenge before/after a match when Jack was in charge?