It was easy to see just how angry many of the home side's supporters were at Turner's Cross on Sunday. Not, on this occasion, with their team's performance - the game against Shelbourne was one of City's best - but rather with the prospect that details of the club's much talked of link-up with Premiership outfit Leicester City will be confirmed at a press conference after tomorrow's game against Shamrock Rovers.

The emotional objections to such a strategy are understandable. One young fan made the case directly to a couple of the club's board members - City have a big catchment area, huge potential and need to be keeping their best players at home rather than sending them on the footballing equivalent of coffin ships to Britain - but she must have known that a polite ear was as much as she could hope for. The deal is done and if Tony Tynan follows Damien Delaney to Filbert Street as most expect, then tomorrow's signing ceremony will be seen as the point where it all started to go terribly wrong.

In fact, it's far more complex than that and from a club director's point of view it must be hard to see the rationale behind rejecting an offer like Leicester's. Under its terms Cork are expected to receive cash, coaching expertise and, as an upshot of the offer's three-way nature, access to Mayfield United's conveniently located training facilities. City are comfortably one of the country's leading six clubs yet they currently have no training ground of their own and no guaranteed access to any near the city centre.

This, of course, is not an act of charity on Leicester's part. Less than a few months after arriving for a fee of just £50,000 Delaney has been judged good enough to play for the first team and that sort of money for a youngster with genuine potential is considered almost too good to be true. The fee has since risen by a fifth because Delaney made his debut for Leicester and it might double eventually, but it's all still buttons to Peter Taylor who would also do well to have a look at Damien O'Rourke the next time he brings Tynan over to England.

The fact remains, however, that players were leaving City for England before Colin Murphy's arrival and departure last summer. Over the past couple of years Brian Barry Murphy and Joe Gamble have both departed, for Preston and Reading respectively, without the club benefitting significantly and, whether the Leicester deal is done or not, more are sure to follow.

Critics of such schemes, particularly Shelbourne's tie-in with Manchester United, insist that the Irish clubs are actually helping the English clubs to establish themselves more firmly in this country, but will United have one more fan here because of their "arrangement"? It's hard to imagine they will. Will they have one more Irish player at Old Trafford because of the deal? Possibly, but it's far from certain.

Just look at Everton's sponsorship of Home Farm a few years back. Before, during and after the deal the Whitehall club packed youngsters off to Elland Road because, it appeared, Everton had little interest in signing them once they were old enough for Home Farm to be interested in letting them go. Everton paid Home Farm a couple of hundred thousand pounds and, as far as anybody can make out, got their names on Home Farm's shirts in return.

Sadly, United and the rest of the English clubs can pretty much pick and choose young Irish talent.

Leicester aren't trying to sign up Cork in order to persuade their promising youngsters to leave Ireland, they're signing them up in order to persuade them to leave Ireland for Leicester rather than Manchester, Liverpool or London.

Can anybody make the player join a particular club? Not in any arrangement made so far and surely not in this one either. Might they be improperly encouraged? You betcha, but that's been happening for decades, deals or no deals, and enough people here seem happy to turn a blind eye.

Shelbourne have no doubts about the benefit of the deal they struck. Their coaches have received coaching from a club that, undeniably, contains more expertise. A few weeks back Alex Ferguson attended a club lunch which raised £50,000. And, assuming they qualify for Europe again then Shelbourne's players will probably prepare this summer at United's new training facilities.

In the meantime the club took a stand over the proposed transfer of Richie baker last season, insisting that they get a fair price for him up front rather than a deal that required him to become the world's most capped player before the fee moved out of the "insulting" category.

The money, expertise and assistance with preparation that they are receiving, meanwhile, is being used in such a way that the club - with access to decent training facilities, better coaches and additional wages for full-time players - are in an improved position to keep young Irish players here at least until their potential can be realised. Barring a ban on the transfer of young players - which would surely be breached in any case - the only proper way of doing that is by offering a genuine alternative.

Shelbourne have a long way to go, of course, and given the choice most kids would still prefer to take their chances in the youth teams of Newcastle of Arsenal. When a Tony Tynan, Richie Foran or Damien O'Rourke decides that staying on for even a couple of years would actually benefit his footballing career, we'll know we've made some important progress. If the English clubs help the National League outfits to get to that point then so much the better.

emalone@irish-times.ie)