Thank you to Michael Clifford for his outstanding article on Roy Keane (Irish Examiner, Jun 16) and his comments on the Irish team/fans’ attitude and performance.

Further to Dermot Druhan’s letter about disrespect shown to the Irish flag (Irish Examiner, Jun 16), over the last weekend two different pubs I was in both had the flag of the Ivory Coast — orange, white, and green, hanging left to right and vertical, with orange on top — the Indian flag.

Finally, with the head of Europe, Angela Merkel, along with EU President Barrosso, ECB head Draghi and other financial spokesperson, publicly advocating a federal Europe, I look forward to our Government and national media debating the pros and cons on such a radical path, especially when rejected in 2005 when it was put to the people of France and the Netherlands.

Your opinion piece on “Faith in society” (Jun 18) was a very welcome piece of journalism, given the extremely poor and generally negative view taken of the Eucharistic Congress by the national media.

Perhaps a collective sadomasochistic streak throughout the nation is to blame.

Your article highlighting research demonstrating that excessive tea drinking may pose a cancer risk was interesting in that the main contaminant found in tea is fluoride.

I’ve heard a number of people give their views on the Eucharistic Congress over the weekend, and some I do have to say I found extraordinarily curmudgeonly.

Boom or bust, our trade unions really don’t care unless it comes to protecting their own interests.

We are entering a period when many significant (mainly military) centenaries will be celebrated — the motivations, commitment and sacrifice of those involved now universally acknowledged in their native country.

How astonishing it was to see top RTÉ broadcasters profess support for the Catholic Church at the Eucharistic Congress.