{"id":166152,"date":"2026-06-18T11:27:04","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T11:27:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/166152\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T11:27:04","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T11:27:04","slug":"ministers-wording-when-talking-about-the-ireland-israel-match-was-unwise-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/166152\/","title":{"rendered":"Minister\u2019s wording when talking about the Ireland-Israel match was unwise \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sir, \u2013 On last Friday\u2019s Six One News, Minister for Sport Patrick O\u2019Donovan<\/a> sounded like a man determined to convince the nation<\/a> that \u201cthere is nothing to see here\u201d. <\/p>\n

Commenting on the news that Uefa<\/a> had approved the FAI<\/a>\u2019s request to hold the October 4th match against Israel <\/a>in a \u201cneutral venue\u201d, overseas and behind closed doors, the Minister insisted \u201cthe most important thing here is that the players are left alone, that management is left alone, and the officers of the FAI are left alone. The decision is now made, in the rules that are laid down by Uefa, and I think that should be respected.\u201d<\/p>\n

But if this decision is solely a matter between the FAI and Uefa, one wonders why the Minister felt the need to hammer the news home with a press statement?<\/p>\n

The Minister\u2019s choice of wording in his wish that \u201cthe players\u201d should be \u201cleft alone\u201d was unwise, given that numerous stakeholders have observed that this is literally what the Government and the FAI have done; abandoning the players to make an individual decision of conscience on whether to line out in a deeply unpopular match against a team representing a genocidal state.<\/p>\n

Ireland manager Heimir Hallgr\u00edmsson has observed that it is \u201cunfair for the players to be in this position\u201d, while defender S\u00e9amus Coleman has said \u201cit should have been dealt with above us … I don\u2019t think we should be in this position. Absolutely not.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is no solution for our players to be \u201cleft alone\u201d on the horns of a dilemma, and despite the speed and force of the Minister\u2019s soundbite, I suspect this matter will return to trouble him. \u2013 Yours, etc,<\/p>\n

Betty Purcell,<\/p>\n

Mount Argus Rd,<\/p>\n

Dublin 6W. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sir, \u2013 On last Friday\u2019s Six One News, Minister for Sport Patrick O\u2019Donovan sounded like a man determined…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4377,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[4002,37,47536,4003,4005],"class_list":["post-166152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-football-association-of-ireland-fai","tag-israel","tag-patrick-o-donovan","tag-republic-of-ireland-mnt","tag-uefa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116770876240433073","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166152"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166152\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}