England and Ireland will never be good sports

Richie Ryan (Arena letter, June 14) thinks it is both racist and bizarre that Irish people want the English soccer team to lose, but he is wrong on both counts.

In fact, there is one very simple explanation for this and it is called ... history.

The history of Ireland and England is long and bloody, with Ireland on the receiving end for most of the bloodshedt.

While the vast majority of Irish people don’t dislike the English, international sport tends to highlight our differences.

Its the same with England and other countries: would Richie shout for France in the World Cup? How many English people would support Germany? What about Poland and Germany — or Holland and Germany?

Richie, like many other people, tries to introduce logic into the argument by mentioning that many Irish people who don’t support England follow Manchester United, Liverpool or Arsenal. These people choose to follow those teams, but we don’t choose our history.

When you try to place logic against history and emotion there can only be one winner.

Neil O’Brien,

37, Oakmount Tower,

Blarney,

Co Cork.