G51 Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 6 minutes ago, virginton said: The strength of a domestic league has no correlation to the success of an international team. Croatia reached a World Cup final in 2018 and their domestic league is an absolute nick, much closer to the LOI than SPFL. I doubt the Irish domestic league was any stronger when Charlton was in charge of their international team of ringers either. Ireland is also in a free travel zone with Scotland and England: a viable springboard and top table country for top footballing talent respectively. The League of Ireland could therefore be diddy drivel at senior level (and it is - I see former Morton 'legend' Billy King even scored this weekend) while still doing a roaring trade in exporting top talent at an younger age to the big leagues. The real issue for them is that football is competing with two other popular sports for athletic talent, while they've had a run of losing every tug of war with England over their best prospects, as well as England C players who would walk into their team under the granny rule like Bamford. The Croatian league is way closer to the SPFL than LOI IMO. That's reflected in the country co-efficients too - Scotland is 11th, Croatia is 18th, Ireland is (hilariously) 37th, tucked in behind Luxembourg and Lithuania. Dinamo Zagreb are the best team in any of the three leagues. You still need a decent domestic league to produce good players. Having the GAA is a massive problem for Irish football, maybe even the major problem. But youth football is severely underfunded in the country, in addition to being severely mismanaged by the FAI. Kids are still coming through Irish youth teams like Cherry Orchard before they head to Scotland and England. The money for these academies comes from the FAI, which gets its money from the domestic league. Less money, less talented players produced. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Dinamo Zagreb would lose to Rangers this season or whichever Celtic/Rangers side was on top at least six times out of ten. Beneath that, the rest of their league makes Scotland look like a bastion of competitive integrity. How much money and top class facilities do you think youth academies in Croatia bask in exactly - accounting for all the sketchy dealings surrounding their clubs and FA before a penny of resale value trickles down to grassroots level? The League of Ireland clearly doesn't have an elite facility for youth players, but that's not a serious issue when the only players who require such facilities will be snapped up at the first opportunity by clubs elsewhere in the British Isles that do have those facilities. Their problems are much more straightforward and unconnected to the LOI - lost talent to other sports, lost players to England. And an utterly useless manager. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fratelli Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 (edited) 38 minutes ago, virginton said: The strength of a domestic league has no correlation to the success of an international team. Croatia reached a World Cup final in 2018 and their domestic league is an absolute nick, much closer to the LOI than SPFL. I doubt the Irish domestic league was any stronger when Charlton was in charge of their international team of ringers either. Ireland is also in a free travel zone with Scotland and England: a viable springboard and top table country for top footballing talent respectively. The League of Ireland could therefore be diddy drivel at senior level (and it is - I see former Morton 'legend' Billy King even scored this weekend) while still doing a roaring trade in exporting top talent at an younger age to the big leagues. The real issue for them is that football is competing with two other popular sports for athletic talent, while they've had a run of losing every tug of war with England over their best prospects, as well as England C players who would walk into their team under the granny rule like Bamford. Whilst i would agree with the first part in general, some of the most influential players in that Croatia squad came from their domestic league. Both Mandzukic and Modric played well over 100 games in the Croatian league before moving to bigger leagues, others such as Corluka and Kovacic were much the same i'm sure. Edited March 28, 2021 by Fratelli 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 (edited) 31 minutes ago, Baptiste Bourgeois said: Are you sure about that? From the outside looking in, the Croatian league looks like its in boom and one of the most rapidly improving leagues in Europe. Dinamo are way better than any team in Scotland, Rijeka have made the Europa League group stages 4 times since 2014, Hajduk have been doing an Aberdeen and getting knocked at the play-off round every year. Plus there's quite a lot of money coming into the league from transfer fees because they keep churning out quality youngsters.12 players left this season alone for over £1M. You're referring to three clubs in an entire country. Scratch beneath them and Osijek, the rest of Croatia's ten team top flight drops down predictably to Scottish League One sized clubs. With a fraction of the gate revenue as well. I haven't seen any credible expert label Croatian domestic football as being anything other than a basketcase. Political tensions aside, Dinamo and co. would be all over a reformed Yugoslav/Balkan League rather than their current nick of a division. Somehow, Croatia keeps churning out top-class footballers regardless. Edited March 28, 2021 by vikingTON 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 (edited) 22 minutes ago, Fratelli said: Whilst i would agree with the first part in general, some of the most influential players in that Croatia squad came from their domestic league. Both Mandzukic and Modric played well over 100 games in the Croatian league before moving to bigger leagues, others such as Corluka and Kovacic were much the same i'm sure. If Luka Modric was playing in a country right next to and with a common travel area with England then he wouldn't have played 100 domestic games. And so long as the parent club did a decent job of nurturing him, that wouldn't have made any difference to his ability level. Arguably it could have even improved his game. Lots of Balkan players have used Serie A for a similar purpose. Genuine talented Irish players can just piggyback off English facilities rather than relying on what Shamrock Rovers can offer them, because it isn't 1952 any more. Edited March 28, 2021 by vikingTON 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djchapsticks Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 (edited) A timely reminder that I'm absolutely gutted that Ireland are going through such a hard time given how magnanimous they were when they pipped us to Euro 2016. Edited March 28, 2021 by djchapsticks 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 2 minutes ago, djchapsticks said: A timely reminder that I'm absolutely gutted that Ireland are going through such a hard time given how magnanimous they were when they pipped us to Euro 2016. Tonight I'm thinking about that c**t in the Leeds top wrapped in the tricolour in the home end whose face was tripping him after Maloney's goal in 2014. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crawford Bridge Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 3 hours ago, Baptiste Bourgeois said: "Clubs: Burton Albion, Rochdale, Preston North End, Portsmouth, Wycombe Wanderers, Luton Town" 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sherrif John Bunnell Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Nigel Hasselbaink scored a hat-trick for the Suriname galacticos as they beat Aruba 6-0. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest TheJTS98 Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 (edited) On 25/03/2021 at 09:03, TheJTS98 said: Interesting to see where Ireland end up. I know they've had a shocking run, but I wouldn't put it past them to do well in this group. Tonight's result is no disaster. 100% standing by this, imo... Although, some are reacting as if this was a 1990s defeat to Luxembourg. They've beaten Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Montenegro, and Cyprus recently and since the last Euros in 2016 have beaten Albania, Hungary (both Euro 2016 qualifiers) and Georgia, and have drawn with France, Bulgaria, and Senegal. In the last qualifiers they lost by only a single goal in each of Northern Ireland, Serbia, and Ukraine. They're not that bad. Add in that Luxembourg's club sides have started doing ok and you get a pretty impressive picture of improvement. Progres beat Rangers, Fola Esch lost narrowly to Aberdeen, Dudelange have made the Europa League group stages twice recently, including beating Legia Warsaw, APOEL, and Cluj, as well as drawing with Betis. They've got players at a decent level. Bad one for Ireland, but the reaction to it is slightly out-dated. Edited March 28, 2021 by TheJTS98 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pawpar Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Glad to see Stephen " I didn't know she was under 16" Kenny doing so badly. Not surprisingly 1 poster supporting this abhorrent behaviour. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ro Sham Bo Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 8 hours ago, Steve_Wilkos said: Haven't heard of 90% of the ROI team. Unlikely to hear of them again after that result. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ro Sham Bo Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 6 hours ago, Distant Doonhamer said: That is indeed an amusing read. "It's like watching Celtic. You watch because they fly the Irish flag" "I don't get how the campaign is in tatters.We can still finish 3rd " 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Starko Rover Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Wait a minute Ireland in Latin is Hibernia! It was only a matter of time before they Hibs’d it. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Venti Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 "Ders moar t' Oirlund din diss." 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lubo_blaha Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 100% standing by this, imo... Although, some are reacting as if this was a 1990s defeat to Luxembourg. They've beaten Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Montenegro, and Cyprus recently and since the last Euros in 2016 have beaten Albania, Hungary (both Euro 2016 qualifiers) and Georgia, and have drawn with France, Bulgaria, and Senegal. In the last qualifiers they lost by only a single goal in each of Northern Ireland, Serbia, and Ukraine. They're not that bad. Add in that Luxembourg's club sides have started doing ok and you get a pretty impressive picture of improvement. Progres beat Rangers, Fola Esch lost narrowly to Aberdeen, Dudelange have made the Europa League group stages twice recently, including beating Legia Warsaw, APOEL, and Cluj, as well as drawing with Betis. They've got players at a decent level. Bad one for Ireland, but the reaction to it is slightly out-dated.It does slightly take the shine off it when you find out the goal was scored by a Dinamo Kiev striker against a Rochdale goalkeeper. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Starko Rover Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 It does slightly take the shine off it when you find out the goal was scored by a Dinamo Kiev striker against a Rochdale goalkeeper.To be fair the ROI aren’t the team they were in the 90s and 00s. Robbie and Roy Keene were huge players for them and they’ll struggle to find players of that quality anytime soon. When you look at the squad they’re probably a bit weaker than we are now in terms of the clubs they play for and I think they’re heading down the rankings not up. Luxembourg are no mugs and haven’t been for a long time but it’s still a team Ireland should be beating at home, even at our weakest we’d be expecting to beat Luxembourg at Hampden. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dunning1874 Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Imagine aspiring to be a serious international team with ambitions of qualifying for tournaments and appointing a manager based on the job they've done in the League of Ireland with Dundalk. It's akin to Scotland appointing Allan Johnston because he's won League One twice. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
San Starko Rover Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 Imagine aspiring to be a serious international team with ambitions of qualifying for tournaments and appointing a manager based on the job they've done in the League of Ireland with Dundalk. It's akin to Scotland appointing Allan Johnston because he's won League One twice.Must be off the back of his startling playing career [emoji23] 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest TheJTS98 Posted March 28, 2021 Share Posted March 28, 2021 1 hour ago, Dunning1874 said: Imagine aspiring to be a serious international team with ambitions of qualifying for tournaments and appointing a manager based on the job they've done in the League of Ireland with Dundalk. It's akin to Scotland appointing Allan Johnston because he's won League One twice. Is it really? Must have missed Allan Johnston taking a LOI side into the group stages of the Europa League, where they far from disgraced themselves. We all remember that time Johnston led QotS to victory over BATE Borisov, then Maccabi Tev Aviv and a draw with AZ. Or that time his QotS side knocked Gothenburg out of Europe. Great times. Or the time he managed Scotland u-21s for a couple of years with a good win percentage. Promoting someone to be national manager from within the set-up is far from unusual. Especially when that manager has also won a rake of trophies in that FA's country, winning five leagues and by my count ten cups, as well as doing well in Europe. He may not be the best coach in the world. But your Johnston comparison has next to nothing to hang on. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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