American friendlies option for Stan

TWO games against South American opposition in the United States are among the options for summer friendly matches for the Republic of Ireland currently being explored by the FAI.

Nothing has yet been confirmed despite Ecuador football association apparently jumping the gun by announcing on their website that a match would take place against Ireland in New York on May 23 — a story carried on the FIFA website.

If Ireland do play in the States in the summer, it will not be as part of a US Cup competition. Instead, Steve Staunton’s men could see themselves playing two friendlies against Ecuador and Bolivia in New York and Boston.

However, it’s understood that contracts for those games have not yet been signed, meaning that a summer trip to America remains only one of a number of options still open to Staunton.

It’s believed the FAI are still investigating the possibility of arranging games in Europe while another option would see the Irish squad revisiting the training camp in Portugal which they used ahead of the friendly against Chile last year.

As things stand, the friendly match against Denmark in Aarhus on August 22 remains the only officially confirmed in 2007.