Niall Quinn: FAI needs to change focus

Given his rounded experience in the game as player, administrator, legend of Irish football and, in his current role as media personality, someone who can usually be relied upon to offer a thoughtful opinion on the issues of the day, it’s hardly a surprise Niall Quinn is periodically touted as a future chief executive of the FAI.

Asked straight out yesterday if he would ever consider the position, he gave what was, initially, a straightforward reply. “No, because what I can’t do is the politics of being a CEO of a sports organisation,” he said.

However, further discussion revealed Quinn is critical of what he seems to regard as the FAI’s trickle-down theory of how the game should be developed in this country with, he argues, too much reliance being placed on the fortunes of the senior international team and not enough on protecting and developing the young talent. But, if a different vision prevailed, then, said Quinn: “I would be very interested.”

Recalling an “informative” period he spent on the board of the Irish Sports Council, Quinn said: “I think John Delaney would actually agree from various meetings I had with him to bring a different view of football in this country and what it’s for and what it’s about would help.

“What I mean by that is, I couldn’t do it as long as you’re depending on your first team to win matches to make sure your development pathways work. I know we’ve had a recession and things have gone the way they have, but it should be sacrosanct: there should be a line drawn between senior football and what it means, and the development of these players.”

Would Quinn not be more effective on the inside making decisions than on the outside as a critic?

“I love football in this country and I take a deep interest in it,” he replied. “I fully understand the difficulties of being in an organisation like the FAI and trying to keep the whole thing in place. But I do feel I was right to say there has to be a different focus on what the league is (and) on what our young players are aspiring to because, sadly, all our aspiring young players are trying to get away even more now than they did in the past.

“And what are they getting away to? In my day, we got away to clubs and it was great if you got to the Championship, or Second Division then, as you had a chance of going up the ladder. It was lovely to go across there, but now you’re taking on Europeans, Africans, Americans, Asians and it’s just so difficult.”

Which remark brought us back to the reason we were talking to Quinn in Dublin yesterday, as he wore his Sky Sports hat for the launch of the Premier League – an English top-flight in which, unlike in his day as a player, there is not a single Irish presence on the pitch among the top four or five clubs.

“Everton now are our great hope,” Quinn conceded. “Everton to have a good year and our players at Everton to really perform. I speak about loyalty but I was really hoping Seamus Coleman would go to United! I think it would have really sparked interest.

“Going back to the development of players, that’s something I’m huge on. If we had a system here where parents didn’t have to take the gamble which is now 100/1 – it was 10/1 in my day, it’s 100/1 now, could be even more. If the FAI stood for that and that alone, or if the League of Ireland stood for that as part of its objectives, then I would be very interested.”

However, his history with football administration in this country has, clearly, not been a happy one.

“I was approached by the FAI to help with the U21s when I first came home and at the last minute that was stopped and I never really got an explanation why it was stopped,” he related.

“I then got involved when I was asked to sit on a panel to help the League of Ireland and after one meeting the Sports Council rang me to say ‘there have been objections to you being on the group’. So I left the group. That was about 10 years ago. I then attempted to do something with Shamrock Rovers but I wasn’t entertained so I went to Sunderland.”

Quinn confirmed recently he spoke “very briefly” to Declan Conroy, the consultant who has been engaged in conducting a review of the League of Ireland. One idea which Quinn feels holds considerable potential for the domestic game is the selling of TV rights to emerging global markets.

“Sports content is becoming a huge thing for TV companies around the world,” he said. “I spent a bit of time in Africa a few years ago and it’s incredible the passion and the love they have for football. And I know that there would be a company there that they could go and do a deal with and say, ‘here’s where Roy Keane played’ or ‘here’s Damien Duff playing in it’. Whatever comes of this task force set up to look at (the League of Ireland), you have to start and say ‘can we envisage seeing Shamrock Rovers playing Bohemians with a good crowd at the match, and you’re in a bar in Kenya’?”