Sir, - Professional football is show business. It is primarily a finance-driven business allied to, but separate from "sport". The players and teams behave and are treated like commodities. The mission of the FAI is to encourage the playing of Association Football in the State. It is assuredly not the protection of affiliated businesses (football clubs) from outside competition.
The National League of Ireland is a competition run to employ semi-professional footballers with spectators and sponsors paying their wages. The Irish game is subjected to annual external quality assessment through competition with teams from other countries. The results repeatedly speak for themselves.
The football public have transferred their interest in large part to the English and Scottish Premier Leagues. Sales of Sky Sports subscriptions, foreign club merchandise and travel agent packages show that this is the case. Furthermore, the FAI relies on non-national league players to perform for the Republic of Ireland team which is its major source of revenue. Individuals and clubs in the Irish game who "scout" for English clubs are not subjected to denigration by the Irish football hierarchy. On the contrary, the success of one Roy Keane can result in massive praise for the person who "discovered" him.
However, those bold enough to try to provide a higher quality football circus located in Dublin for the entertainment of Irish fans will be blocked with as much vigour as the FAI can muster. This farcical, monopolistic behaviour should be subjected to scrutiny by national and European authorities and undoubtedly it soon will be, compliments of Colm McCarthy and Clydebank or the Wimbledon group. In essence, Clydebank or the Dublin Dons will provide the choice of a potentially higher quality entertainment product to the Irish public.
The claim that advertising revenue will follow these enterprises to the detriment of the National League franchises is not a valid reason for conspiring to prevent competition. If the performance of players in the National League does not generate enough money to pay their currently high wages, well, that's just tough. - Yours, etc.,
Bill Tormey
Glasnevin Avenue, Dublin 11.