Kenny Cunningham: Ireland v Israel game should have stayed in Dublin

Cunningham believes Ireland and Israel's Nations League game, which has been moved to Serbia, should have stayed in Dublin. He would respect any player who decides they do not want to play in the fixture

Kenny Cunningham was promoting Premier Sports – the home of live football and rugby including Uefa club competitions, English Premier League, BKT United Rugby Championship, Investec Champions Cup and EPCR Challenge Cup. Premier Sports is available as part of the Sports Extra package on Sky, NOW and Virgin. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

Former Ireland captain Kenny Cunningham insists the FAI should not boycott the upcoming fixtures against Israel and wishes the home match wasn't moved to a neutral country.

Israel’s genocide in Palestine prompted FAI members last November to seek an unsuccessful motion with Uefa for the suspension of the country’s international and club fixtures.

Although the FAI vowed to fulfil their game on October 4 at Lansdowne Road after the countries were paired together in February’s Uefa Nations League draw, a tennis ball protest during the May friendly against Qatar led to a rethink. That game will now be played in Bačka Topola, Serbia, behind closed doors.

Israel have, since the October 7 attacks, been forced to stage their ‘home’ games outside of their homeland, meaning Debrecen in Hungary will also host the first meeting with Ireland on September 27.

Former Ireland captains James McClean and Louise Quinn, along with ex-manager Brian Kerr and Shamrock Rovers skipper Pico Lopes have backed the Stop The Game campaign, a movement intent on ensuring Ireland don’t share a pitch with Israel.

Ireland manager Heimir Hallgrímsson has, stretching back to last October, expressed surprise at how a different standard was applied by Fifa and Uefa to Russia, who remain barred from all competitive football in the world arising from their invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Former captain Séamus Coleman spoke of how the handling of the fixtures by the FAI and Government has left players in an ‘uncomfortable’ situation’.

Cunningham, who won 72 caps between 1995 and 2005, says he would respect any player’s desire to make themselves unavailable on grounds of conscience, yet doesn’t foresee that being the case.

“My gut reaction tells me that the majority of players would want to play it,” he said, speaking at a Premier Sports event, where his fellow pundit Shay Given refused to discuss the Israel matches.

“For any player who decides not to turn up for those Israel games, it won't be the end of his Ireland international career.

"In fact, he might get some plaudits, a bit of respect from people. But that option is there for him.

“It is messy but I think the game should have gone ahead in Dublin.

“It would be a good thing to see the Israeli team come onto our venue, to see their national anthem respected inside the stadium because, that for me, that would send a signal from the Irish people to the Israeli people who have suffered as well in this conflict too.

“On a human level, we are actually together here. There are politicians making decisions around this, but genuinely between the Israeli people and the Irish people there is a bit of understanding there on a human level about what has been happening.

“So, I would like to see that, in a funny way. I know people will say ‘how can you suggest that?’ But I think it would resonate more for me rather than people throwing things at the Israelis or spraying paint on walls in hotels that the Israeli team would have stayed in.

“Us denying the Israelis a game in Dublin and then cancelling the game doesn’t move things any way forward in it in a positive way.” 

The former Millwall, Wimbledon and Birmingham City defender feels the viewpoint of the Irish people towards Israel has already been conveyed.

“There are plenty of avenues available to express an opinion and rightly so,” the 55-year-old explained.

“There is not a weekend that goes by when you don’t see people in Ireland protesting on the streets. And that is a good thing.

“There is a perception about how Irish people feel about Israel and Israeli foreign policies, the Palestinian issue.

“That is pretty much out there already, we all know where people stand, so I don’t feel cancelling this game takes the argument any further.

“What about if we draw Israel for next year’s Euros? Are we not going to play those games again and accept expulsion from the Euros here in Dublin in 2028.

“That's where we're going, if we're being consistent.

“Who's going to take the pain of that? I'd suggest some people who are actually not huge football supporters won’t take an amount of pain. But the players will and that rubs me up.”