Soccer News Eircom League: The prospect of a number of the country's leading clubs breaking away from the Eircom League and establishing a new "Premiership" has receded for the moment at least as officials from around the country gathered in Dublin last night to consider Saturday's events at Citywest and the FAI's proposals regarding a merger between the league and association.

After a lengthy meeting of club officials, a proposal from Derry City that a meeting be sought with FAI chief executive Fran Rooney in order to clarify what would be on the table in the event of a merger was adopted.

In the end, six delegates - three from each division - were selected to attend the meeting which, it is intended, will take place before the end of the week (probably Thursday).

Jim Roddy (Derry City), Jim Murphy (Cork City), Ollie Byrne (Shelbourne), Paddy McCaul (Athlone Town), Eddie Slevin (Bray Wanderers) and Ray Gallagher (Sligo Rovers) were chosen to form the delegation.

There was some discussion as to whether the officials representing clubs from the two different divisions should seek to meet Rooney separately, but it was eventually agreed that all would attend the one meeting and report back to the rest of the clubs.

With most of the bigger Premier Division outfits keen to proceed with the merger, the delegation's task will be to assess the FAI's ability to deliver on the range of the proposals made at Saturday's meeting in Citywest.

Speaking there, Rooney said that he felt that in the event the merger were to proceed the association would aim to provide an annual pool of €1 million in prize money and to help clubs substantially increase their overall revenues in other areas.

Representatives of first division clubs will be anxious to ensure that the emphasis is not placed entirely on improving things just for the bigger clubs.

It was also agreed at the meeting that, in the wake of Brendan Dillon's resignation over the weekend, Declan O'Luanaigh would continue as acting chairman of the league until next month's annual general meeting. O'Luanaigh will attend any meetings arranged with Rooney in relation to the proposed merger.

Earlier in the day, the first meeting took place of the FAI's new board of management, now made up of just nine people, at Jury's Hotel.

Afterwards, Rooney said that the meeting had gone well and that the reduction in numbers had paid immediate benefits in terms of the amount of business that had been dealt with.

"We discussed the stadium issue, sponsorship, the Football Trust which we hope to bring in, the fan's group that we want to do, friendlies and several other issues," he said.

"I also briefed the board on Saturday's meeting with the league. We've left them with the document for discussion. The next stage is that they'll come back to us and talk."

Rooney subsequently expressed delight at the news carried by RTÉ that the Minister for Sport, John O'Donoghue, had confirmed his intention to bring his proposals in relation to the stadium issue to Cabinet by the end of the month.

The association, meanwhile, will this afternoon confirm the details of its ticketing arrangements for the friendly games against Brazil and the Czech Republic.

Even last night FAI officials hadn't given up hope of lining up a third home game that might be sold as part of a package in order to help the huge cost of bringing the world champions to Dublin, but it was confirmed that if no opponents can be confirmed by this morning then the organisation will go ahead with selling tickets on the basis of the two games.

Tickets for friendly matches normally range between €15 and €40 with all prices being raised by €10 for competitive games.

Prices in this instance will depend on whether there are two or three matches being bundled, but a spokesman for the association said last night that even in the event that a third game is not lined up in time, admission is likely to fall somewhere between the two price ranges.