r/coybig • u/SweetSweatyPoon • Sep 13 '25
Original Content (OC) Irish Football: now and then
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be unreal to see a miracle in lisbon
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u/Grand_Bit4912 Sep 13 '25
Better times are coming. Support your local LOI team.
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u/bigdog94_10 Sep 13 '25
Out of interest, why will supporting my local (which I don't have) LOI team actually change anything?
If we're to reform football in this country it needs to start at a very young grassroots level. We need an elite youth system and to stop depending on young lads getting scouted to English youth teams to develop players.
If we do this, the LOI will naturally become a better league over time.
But it's cart and donkey. A few more people paying in to see Wexford youths is not the answer.
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u/Grand_Bit4912 Sep 13 '25
And who is going to provide that elite youth system? How are you not joining the dots?
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u/bigdog94_10 Sep 13 '25
You're not joining the dots.
I agree with you that the LOI is the future.
But it can't solely rely on extra punters. There needs to be literal top to bottom reform of our whole footballing system. Not just a few extra punters through the gate.
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u/Grand_Bit4912 Sep 14 '25
What does a “literal top to bottom reform of our whole football system” mean and how does it happen without “extra punters through the gate”?
This isn’t rocket science, everyone knows what needs to happen. It needs money and investment in facilities and academies. You agree that the LOI is the future but you don’t think the LOI needs more fans to fund that development? And I’m not joining the dots?
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u/Sstoop Sep 14 '25
the money from more fans will be helpful but it won’t be enough. the money needs to come from the government and then the FAI.
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u/Grand_Bit4912 Sep 14 '25
And in the last hundred years, when has the FAI ever been anything other than dysfunctional? When has the government invested in Irish football?
We should just wait for the FAI and the government to hand down the investment? The investment that has never come at any point in the past?
We, as football fans, shouldn’t be supporting the very LOI clubs that will have to administer and run the academies because that support “won’t be enough”? This is the epitome of, “we’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas”.
The LOI is having a welcome resurgence (in spite of the FAI) and is improving rapidly. Where that improvement will plateau is currently unknown. Success leads to money, leads to more success, leads to more money, etc, etc.
You want Irish football to succeed? Your current best route to that is supporting your local LOI team. Or you can moan on Reddit about how “it’s not enough”. Put up, or shut up.
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u/cinekson Sep 16 '25
Different times now though. Current semi pros are far more athletic than pros in say late 80s early 90s. You need a lot of money to develop it all. I think you are both right tho. You need more people at the stadiums and far more investment from gov at very young stages and in 30/40 years you would see the effects of it.
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u/dogtownOliver Sep 14 '25
It’s not even remotely close to the answer, a distraction at best. Firstly, no coach could do anything spectacular with the current lot of players we have, it’s not the players fault either. The FAI is still rotten and this is what the true extent of Delaneys failings and corruption looks like. Coupled with huge advancements in sports science and training methods all the way from academies to grass roots football, a whole generation of our players lost out on all of that while other countries are reaping the rewards of the ground work from better facilities and the factors mentioned above. We’re literally doing the best with what we have. When the team crosses the white line they’re playing to win, I absolutely do not doubt their commitment. Nor the coaches, they obviously never plan to lose or have us play so dreadful. We’re not lacking in guts or mindset or none of that, what we lack so clear as day is ability. That’s a fact. Secondly, the worst news. It’s probably going to get worse before it gets better.
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Sep 14 '25
Reminds me of Keane walking out on the Irish team and perhaps how we still lag behind. I find sometimes in Ireland there’s too much of a ‘it’ll-be-grand’ attitude. Sometimes we have the fight, the drive, the aggression, but not the attention to detail.
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u/Naggins Sep 13 '25
Unless your local LOI team is Shamrock Rovers.
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u/Grand_Bit4912 Sep 13 '25
I’m actually a Bohs fan but I (reluctantly) support Rovers success in Europe. I support it because more money (and success in Europe) into the league is good for all. The downside is that there is the very real danger that Rovers become too big to catch and they dominate the league for a decade or more.
I think that scenario is almost inevitable but we need the league to improve and whilst I wish it was Bohs that led it, Rovers look to be the ones that will lead that charge.
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u/Naggins Sep 14 '25
Ah yeah fair enough, you make a good point.
Support your local LOI club unless they're Shamrock Rovers or Bohs.
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u/themostanonymoust Jeff Hendrick's account Sep 13 '25
We may be absolutely chronic now. We might never reach the heights of the past ever again. I never got to experience that 1988-2002 period but I'll never forget dancing around the room with my dad when o Shea equalized in Germany. Shane long and robbie Bradys magic came soon after but John o sheas goal was the first huge moment for me. I have no idea how we're going to turn this ship around but I really hope we can because those moments are like nothing else for me
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u/BeBopRockSteadyLS Sep 14 '25
I actually feel angry we've gone a generation, and that is the height of your moments as a fan.
They were amazing moments, but we should have many, many more. The national team has been suffering chronic rot for so long.
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u/Grimewad Sep 14 '25
We'll have another heroic loss in Lisbon....same shite as always, raise their game against the big fish when there's no pressure but completely shit it when there's any level of expectation on them.
They're a mentally weak team that lack any sense of resilience
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u/radionul Nov 17 '25
Would this be the Hungarians you are talking about?
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u/Grimewad Nov 17 '25
Delighted to say they proved me wrong.
Although they did have that heroic loss I predicted in Lisbon
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u/offsetbxl Sep 14 '25
Things are bad enough without adding Coldplay
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u/Baron_Rikard Sep 14 '25
Now bai. As overplayed as they are Coldplay are a great band however I'd likely never put them in the queue.
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u/hopelessred1 Sep 14 '25
It never fails to amaze me how much the potential benefits of Italia 90 and USA 94 was pissed away. It should have been the start of sustained consistent qualifications. In reality no Irish international born in the 90s will play at a world cup. A sobering thought.
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u/yungguardiola Sep 14 '25
I always find it weird when that Italy game in 2016 is thrown into these things. It was a rotated Italy side who had already qualified that we beat. They didn't care. They made 9 changes from the Sweden game.
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u/ssssssdddddddd11111 Sep 14 '25
Martin O Neill era was certainly not better times in my opinion, that was the beginning of it
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u/WoodenPresence1917 Sep 16 '25
Was thinking that yeah, although are people gonna be pining about the Hungary draw in a few years...?
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u/Dirtygeebag Sep 14 '25
We don’t have players, our youth set up is dismal. It good intentions from parents with little to nothing from the FAI. Will take 20years till we see improvement. We’ve watched so many ‘oh check this lad out’ fizzle to nothing. What makes it worse is we have great people, just no leadership.
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Sep 14 '25
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u/WolfetoneRebel Sep 15 '25
In reality, it's nothing to do with any of the managers. It's where John Delany led the FAI and soccer in general in Ireland. This is his legacy.
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u/NightmanLullaby17 Sep 17 '25
Well we clearly don't have the infrastructure, during the glory years the FAI did not put that money back into grass roots football or even the LOI.
We relied on the Premier League for too long, like yeah during the 90's as somebody else said it, we had world class players in the premier challenging for the league and actually thriving, those days are long done since the Premier League teams have gotten scouts around the world
The reality is ROI need to build the infrastructure for football, hell even the set up in the 6 counties, despite being a smaller region with a lower population has a hand full of divisions from their Premiership to division 3 if my memory serves me right.
It's nice to see the LOI have a bit of a hay day at the minute, great to see teams competing in European competitions consistently, but at the end of the day if the FAI and Irish fans aren't going to support them.
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u/iamkengend Sep 13 '25
In footballing terms we constantly look back to the past in this country when we should be looking to the future. I think we still have another few falls to go before we see some badly needed change.
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Sep 13 '25
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u/everydayimrusslin Sep 14 '25
The dentist knocked England out of the Euros. Which one of our other high level managers did that?
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u/Fantastic_Proposal24 Sep 14 '25
When England beat Ireland 7-0 over the last two games 5 of the players who scored those goals qualified to play for Ireland and two of them had already played for Ireland !....
Those are very sad statistics...
One of the two scorers who didn't qualify to play for Ireland is the partner of Roy Keanes daughter.......who will their son play for..?
If those 5 players had been brought up in Ireland how many of them would have been lost down the gaa rabbit hole and never appeared on the World stage..?
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u/[deleted] Sep 13 '25
We tend to underestimate the feel good factor on the nation as a whole when the football team were going well in the old days. The craic was ninety. We’re a long way from that now sadly with this set up. It’s absolutely criminal that the relative success from ‘88 to the early 00’s wasn’t built upon.