{"id":358762,"date":"2026-02-27T08:21:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T08:21:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/358762\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T08:21:14","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T08:21:14","slug":"flares-controversy-fai-agrees-to-cctv-and-sniffer-dogs-at-stadiums-after-ministers-funding-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/358762\/","title":{"rendered":"Flares controversy: FAI agrees to CCTV and sniffer dogs at stadiums after minister\u2019s funding threat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-91174671_secondary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom4 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop4\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\" data-testid=\"title-summary\">O\u2019Donovan held a hard line after child was injured by flare at match\n<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Sports Minister Patrick O\u2019Donovan\u2019s (left) threat appeared to be at odds with Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin\u2019s stance\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/POD MM FAI.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">Sports Minister Patrick O\u2019Donovan\u2019s (left) threat appeared to be at odds with Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin\u2019s stance<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">The Football Association of Ireland (FAI) has bowed to pressure to introduce tougher security measures such as sniffer dogs and CCTV at League of Ireland games after Sports Minister Patrick O\u2019Donovan threatened to pull funding for new astro pitches. <\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">This came after a child was hospitalised with facial injuries and serious damage was done to a new artificial surface costing \u20ac500,000 after a flare was thrown at the Louth derby between Dundalk and Drogheda United at Oriel Park, which Mr O\u2019Donovan had attended.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"O\u2019Donovan held a hard line after child was injured by flare at match Sports Minister Patrick O\u2019Donovan\u2019s (left)&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":358763,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[76],"tags":[157193,43517,84512,18,18142,4771,19,17,5765,4574,1181,24556,34340,132],"class_list":["post-358762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-charlie-mcconalogue","tag-drogheda-united-fc","tag-dundalk-fc","tag-eire","tag-fai","tag-fianna-fail","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-micheal-martin","tag-patrick-odonovan","tag-rte","tag-rte-radio-1","tag-senan-molony","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116141626965565222","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358762\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/358763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}