Sport

Brendan Crossan: boo-boys shouldn't be a barrier to progress

Action from the Unite the Union Champions Cup second Leg match between Dundalk and Linfield at Oriel Park in Dundalk on Monday night, which was marred by some unsavoury chants
Action from the Unite the Union Champions Cup second Leg match between Dundalk and Linfield at Oriel Park in Dundalk on Monday night, which was marred by some unsavoury chants Action from the Unite the Union Champions Cup second Leg match between Dundalk and Linfield at Oriel Park in Dundalk on Monday night, which was marred by some unsavoury chants

AND so just like that the all-island league – football’s future – was dead in the water. Tossed away like a sweetie wrapping paper.

Some pro-IRA chants in Oriel Park and Dundalk’s 6-0 thrashing of Linfield in the second leg of the Unite the Union Champions Cup were held up as compelling reasons why an all-island league is just not on.

A week earlier, the Irish FA kicked into touch the All-Island Advocacy Group’s lofty notions of raising football standards here.

If the Irish FA’s perceived negativity towards merging the two top leagues on this island wasn’t demoralising enough, some commentators on social media rammed home the point after the unsavoury chants in Oriel Park, while there was also the unfurling of an offensive flag in the Linfield supporters’ end.

With occasional matches taking place between clubs from either side of the border, there will always be an unruly element that invades the sporting arena that harm the image of Dundalk FC and Linfield FC.

Various pieces of video footage from Monday night’s second leg were posted on social media - and so the selective moralising and finger-pointing swung into gear.

But, of course, there was no moral high ground to be found in the debate no matter how articulate the accompanying words were in some posts.

Earlier that evening, I watched an episode of Pop Goes Northern Ireland on BBCNI where it trawled through the bloody events of 1991.

It’s the kind of programme that never fails to stir you, offering a stark reminder of just how awful ‘The Troubles’ were and prompts you to want more than ever a fully functioning power-sharing executive at Stormont as you watch footage of grieving relatives clutching one another for dear life.

It is one harrowing TV interview after another.

The programme also recalled the night - November 5 - when the UDA threw a grenade at Cliftonville supporters as they made their way into Windsor Park for a game against Linfield.

No-one, miraculously, was injured in the blast.

If the same curious logic emerging from Oriel Park the other night was applied to the Irish League during the dark days, then the shutters would have been pulled down on local football a long time ago.

Through everything, football went on. Cliftonville continued to compete with Linfield at football.

The Irish League is by no means perfect and there can always be more bridges built between clubs, but it must be acknowledged a lot of opposition supporters mingle with one another at pre-match lunches before fixtures.

For instance, Cliftonville will hold a lunch in a few weeks’ time ahead of their match with Carrick Rangers, with opposition supporters attending the event.

Ballymena United have been running these events for years.

When Cliftonville played Glentoran at Solitude a couple of seasons ago, the Ballymac Glentoran Supporters Club bought four tables at the pre-match lunch gig.

You can never underestimate the unifying force of sport.

And yet, people insist some unsavoury chanting between rivals fans in Oriel Park on Monday night is sufficient reason to ditch the proposed all-island league.

While we're at it, maybe we should build a 10-foot wall along the outskirts of Newry.

Maybe we should resurrect army checkpoints and spy posts around all border regions. (Wait around long enough and post-Brexit might deliver that for us).

Maybe we should ban phrases like ‘cross-border co-operation’ from northern vernacular.

Maybe us northerners should not have anything to do with Dundalk, Shamrock Rovers, Cork City and Galway United for fear of a group of non-football people turning up and trying to offend each other with political slogans and chants.

If clubs like Dundalk and Linfield were exposed to one another on a more regular basis in, say, an all-island league where football standards would undoubtedly soar and revenue streams multiply, the boo-boys that only turn up for ‘contentious’ fixtures might feel a little isolated.

Maybe a few ‘cross-border’ football matches between Linfield and Dundalk’s youth teams could be arranged as curtain-raisers at Oriel Park and Windsor Park.

Maybe there could be photo opps for the big wigs of both clubs as they press the flesh and hail their charitable donations to youth football development schemes.

This is not rocket science.

And this notion Irish League clubs would simply not be able to compete with their League of Ireland counterparts following Dundalk’s surgical unpicking of the Blues on Monday night is equally ridiculous as allowing a sectarian element on either side to win.

For starters, in the build-up to the first leg, David Healy’s comments sent the wrong message to his players and the club’s supporters.

While acknowledging the sponsors putting significant amounts of money into local communities from the two-legged affair, the Linfield manager nevertheless bemoaned the scheduling of the Unite the Union Champions Cup.

“There will be quite a number of changes to the team, and the squad, that’s for sure,” Healy said.

“I can’t imagine that, come the end of April, I’m going to be sat as Linfield manager recognised for winning the Unite the Union Champions Cup and nothing else. Take out of that what you want.”

Linfield’s schedule has been quite tough, but it’s always a mistake to give your players a get-out through your own ambivalence towards certain games.

The Republic of Ireland faced New Zealand in a friendly match in Dublin last night.

The game was a complete distraction ahead of their Euro 2020 business with Denmark on Monday night.

But McCarthy was in no mood to entertain that notion because if he did, his players would probably follow suit.

“Hey,” McCarthy cautioned reporters on Wednesday morning. “This will be a competitive game against New Zealand. When I look back on any ‘friendlies’ that we used to play in – they weren’t ‘friendlies’. So let’s get that out of the way.

“I’ve never played a friendly in my life. New Zealand will be as fit as fleas. [My players] need to make sure it’s competitive and run as hard as they can and challenge as hard as they can.”

McCarthy added: “You’ve got to do it properly. I’ve never ever seen any [other] way of playing except at absolutely 100 per cent.”

Compare Mick McCarthy’s pre-match comments to Healy’s disappointing pitch before their first leg with Dundalk.

It’s arguable that the Linfield manager removed a competitive edge from his own team by his words - because players are always the manager's audience - and the Blues ended up losing 7-1.

To suggest the one-sided scoreline was evidence of the overall gulf in class between the Irish League and League of Ireland is perhaps slightly disingenuous and seems like another poorly disguised reason to run a mile from ambition while at the same time happily slouching and accepting mediocrity as the standard.