An all-Ireland team would be the real achievement for O’Neill and Keane

FAI boss John Delaney believes qualification for the European Championships in 2016 would be an appropriate way to mark the centenary of the 1916 Easter Rising, especially now as we have a manager who not only was born in the six counties but was captain of its Northern Ireland football team.

Whatever about Delaney’s logic in that regard, it raised the question as to whether O’Neill’s appointment could heal not just the division between his new assistant Roy Keane and the FAI (and a chunk of the public) but between the two football associations on this island. It was a question Delaney didn’t seem to have expected during his round of broadcast interviews on Tuesday to reveal the signing of the managerial dream team. Quickly, Delaney sought to emphasise that any answers he gave me were his own personal opinion and not in his role as chief executive of the FAI. But he opined that a united Ireland football team would not come before there was a political settlement, by which it seemed he meant a united Ireland.

Given that he is likely to be waiting a long time for that, it would seem that the idea of a 32-county football team is nowhere near fruition. Indeed, the question is how many people in positions of authority in either football association would have a grá for the idea, no matter how popular it might be with a majority of football fans (with a significant minority in opposition).