Sport

Time for the IFA to grasp a few nettles and lead from the front

Brendan Crossan

Brendan Crossan

Brendan is a sports reporter at The Irish News. He has worked at the media outlet since January 1999 and specialises in GAA, soccer and boxing. He has been the Republic of Ireland soccer correspondent since 2001 and has covered the 2002 and 2006 World Cup finals and the 2012 European Championships

Former Northern Ireland manager Michael O'Neill says the playing of God Save The Queen should be reviewed
Former Northern Ireland manager Michael O'Neill says the playing of God Save The Queen should be reviewed Former Northern Ireland manager Michael O'Neill says the playing of God Save The Queen should be reviewed

IT felt there was more than a little choreography going on in recent days over whether or not the playing of ‘God Save The Queen’ was the correct way to encourage more players from nationalist backgrounds to play for Northern Ireland.

The fact that the debate has been ignited from within the environs of the Northern Ireland football community – namely former manager Michael O’Neill and the women’s international captain Marissa Callaghan - is hugely significant.

Normally, the anthem debate attracts the media’s attention when another northern-born footballer declares for the south.

The player explains the reasons behind their alleged ‘defection’, the media assumes familiar positions, the radio phone-ins are hopping – and the poor fella is used as a political football for a couple of days before he’s allowed to get on with his career.

A couple of observations on the recent conversation. O’Neill has obviously felt for some time that the playing of ‘God Save The Queen’ before Northern Ireland game is a problem.

The pity is he didn’t publicly articulate this view during his time in charge of the Northern Ireland senior team – in an effort to force change.

Perhaps O’Neill felt he couldn’t be as candid in the role as he would have liked because it would upset too many of the team’s followers.

Instead, he'd go on the offensive and aim a few broadsides at the FAI for their perceived ‘poaching’ of Catholic players from the north.

He repeated this argument in UTV’s Up Close series.

Of course, it’s a bit more nuanced than raiding an orchard for apples.

Were James McClean or Shane Duffy so passive in the ‘poaching’ process?

Or maybe they felt a greater sense of Irishness and wanted to play for an international team that reflected that.

Take Mark Sykes, a former U21 Northern Ireland international, as a case study.

I interviewed the Ormeau Road man earlier this year about his decision to declare for the south.

“At the end of the day, I see myself as an Irish person and the right thing for me to do was to represent Republic of Ireland. It’s that simple,” he said.

Without question, Sykes would have been capped at senior level by the north, but there were no such guarantees from the Republic of Ireland.

The Oxford United midfielder is still waiting on his first call-up from manager Stephen Kenny. It may never come, and he knows this could be the way it plays out.

But it says something about Sykes that he is prepared to wait on a call that may never come rather than play international football for a team he doesn't feel any emotional affinity to.

While in the Northern Ireland job, O’Neill focused on the symptom rather than the root cause.

Now at Stoke City, O’Neill probably feels he has the freedom to turn his gaze a little to the root cause – or at least one of the root causes – by addressing the thorny issue of playing ‘God Save The Queen’ and how it is hindering Northern Ireland’s prospects.

Marissa Callaghan’s voice is of equal significance too.

A Catholic from west Belfast, Callaghan loves pulling on the green jersey but wants an anthem where she can stand tall and sing the anthem “as loud as I can”.

Underage IFA coaches right across the representative teams are talking more openly about the negative impact of playing ‘God Save The Queen’ before games.

Notably, IFA chief Patrick Nelson said the association would be happy to “join any official public debate”. Not exactly an impassioned appeal for change, or one that the IFA would play a lead role in, but it’s a start nonetheless.

For years, the IFA has been missing a trick on building bridges in northern society.

In the interests of reconciliation and maximising its sporting potential, the playing of ‘God Save The Queen’ should have been reviewed a long time ago and a forum created comprising sporting and civic figures to debate how Northern Ireland teams can put their best foot forward.

There should have been TV marketing campaigns launched years ago celebrating the racial, cultural diversity of the team, bi-lingual billboards dotted around the city and beyond, a museum at Windsor Park doing the same, British and Irish flags fluttering together at games and ‘God Save The Queen’ and Amhrán na bhFiann anthems being played.

All these things can be game-changers for the sport and wider society in general.

The central thrust of any meaningful change should be celebrating British and Irish culture.

No more IFA own-goals – like the playing of ‘God Save The Queen’ at the 2018 Irish Cup final between Cliftonville and Coleraine, and ditching its own worthy policy on a whim of “fostering a politically neutral environment” for its domestic showpiece competition.

International teams are powerfully symbolic forces.

They are essential architecture of any successful nation.

So, where are the great state-builders of our time?

What we currently have here is an international football team that’s gotten used to its limp and its awkward gait.

It's true that in recent years the IFA has worked hard at purging the ‘Billy Boys’ element from Windsor Park and there’s a happy, child-friendly atmosphere at international games.

But the association is still dancing around some thorny issues and must grasp them at some point to get more buy-in from players of the nationalist tradition, and everything that flows from that.

Perhaps O'Neill and Callaghan's comments will act as a catalyst.

Of course, with any project for change, the IFA is not helped by the volatile political discourse of the day where everything is painted in zero-sum terms, where you can’t give without losing, and how this kind of mind-set contaminates everything.

Nevertheless, the association needs to lead from the front more than it has done, be more daring, more dynamic and creative in its thinking, otherwise they'll continue to take three steps forward and two back, and be stuck in a familiar, unhealthy groove for generations to come.