Mooney: FAI moving away from Delaney chapter

The FAI’s caretaker general, manager Noel Mooney, says he could not understand John Delaney’s focus on having the association debt-free by 2020.

Disastrous sales for the FAI’s ‘Vantage Club’ premium ticket scheme — designed to fund the organisation’s €74m portion of the Lansdowne Road redevelopment project — triggered cuts across all football departments.

Mooney himself was made redundant as the association’s marketing manager in 2011. Delaney’s defence of the ticket scheme was to insist all stadium debts would be cleared by 2020. The former chief executive has in recent weeks quit the organisation.

The FAI has liabilities of up to €40m, including an emergency overdraft facility from Uefa. Former Cork City and Shamrock Rovers goalkeeper Mooney took up a position with Uefa but has returned to his former employers on a six-month secondment, due to finish in six weeks.

He won’t be sticking around after that, returning to Switzerland where his wife has just given birth to their son. He feels the FAI has a long way to go before public trust is restored. The organisation must also still regain the faith of the Government, which has cut out state funding.

Sports Minister Shane Ross objected to Mooney’s return, claiming he was an ally of Delaney’s and part of the “old FAI”.

“I came into a shitstorm in May,” Limerick native Mooney told the Lansdowne Roar Podcast.

I could see the FAI was in real, real trouble, needing leadership and desperately required money. The FAI has a strong leader for many years, arguably too strong.

“John Delaney came from an accountancy background and wanted to clear the stadium debt by 2020. I could never understand that and the goalposts have changed. We’re extending out the debt quite a few years. We’re now moving away from the John Delaney chapter.

“The FAI brand can be far, far better but it is not damaged beyond repair.”

Mooney is also disappointed that Brian Kerr rejected his overtures for an unspecified role for Irish football.

He said: “I emailed Brian to say we could meet for a coffee to see how he could help Irish football. That was basically it. I wonder has the bitterness become too much for Brian and he can’t get out of it.

“That just happens sometimes. I’ve met people who can’t get their head past something. For me, that’s quite sad.”