[laughs]

Number four, yeah, in total.

They come, they come in different guises, but this is the, this is the latest of them.

But, uh, I suppose as I said, he's coming from a different perspective, but it's a bit of a like a Desert Island Discs.

He's looking back at matches from when he was a child, you know, coming up, and he even, East Stirlingshire as a manager getting beaten 6-2 and what he learned from that.

It's not, it's not the obvious ones.

It's not like the Aberdeen Cup Winners' Cup or the two Champions Leagues that he won in '99 and 2008.

So you'd be reasonably confident, John?

Yeah, I want to bring John in on that one, the Israeli press conference.

Yeah, it's...

All of them have been, you know, Bands used the word bizarre.

Like, it's...

Like, the press officer from...

Like, they had two press officers there on...

Saturday evening they had a manager and a player and the player clearly was well media trained not to get involved in any questions about the refusal of the handshakes or the bowing of the head he was simply in media mode quite an inexperienced player only four caps so he didn't really contribute much the manager at this stage we know is quite a competent character in terms of handling questions he's seems to kill people with kindness more than anything.

What do you think of that reflection, John?

John, I don't know what your thoughts are on the same

question.

Yeah, just glad to be over.

Really just glad to be out of this environment.

Very strange, disconcerting environment.

Like, just the football terms, Israel are the weakest team in the group, so there's a disappointment that we haven't come away with six points.

But you do have to take into consideration some mitigation.

What do you think of that reflection, John?

And John, sorry to jump in there, but that whole, you know, the sanctions, there didn't seem to be any clarity over the past few days as to, you know, what exactly would happen if we chose not to play these games? You know, people are even suggesting, you know, Kevin Doyle talking about League of Ireland teams being potentially sanctioned, people saying we could have our co-hosting of Euro 2028 taken off us, but there seemed to be a lack of clarity around what would actually happen if we decided not to play the games.

Yeah, there's been a lack of clarity since February the 7th when the draw was made because people have been trying to extract from UEFA what the punishment would be.

And therefore, most of it is based on suppositions or what Paul Cook called as undetermined sanctions.

So let's deal with something that we mentioned there, the Euro 2028 co-hosting, that that would come under threat by the Ireland boycotting officials.

there's nowhere where there's any connection available that would state that.

And Paul Cook was challenged on that point, and he admitted that UEFA have not specifically levelled that threat at the FAO.

So why was this on this document that the General Assembly members made yesterday before they took the vote, which was ultimately 68% in favour? There's all sorts of other potential punishments that were mentioned previously, 5 to 10 million in lost revenue and then tens of millions were also at risk by Ireland simply just not fulfilling two fixtures.

But what's your perspective on all of that?

As an example, how many senior international caps did Daniel Kearns get after making the transfer? Even Michael Duffy, who was in our squad and has been a really good player for Derry in the past, made an international transfer but was never recognized with a position in the squad." Uh, John, before we get into any of this, were the FAI right to approach Cadelac O'Neill?

Absolutely.

And they didn't do it without, uh, first knowing that the player was interested, uh, in making that switch.

This didn't happen just last week or last month.

This has been ongoing for a couple of years as, as far as I'm aware.

Um, it's probably just come to a head in the last few months for a number of reasons, and you sort of outlined a bit of the track record there.

But, you know, Cadelac O'Neill would've been touted as, as a young lad as being a special talent.

Yeah

... dead in, in the water.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

No, I think, uh, realistically, that's, that's not gonna happen.

Well, in the first instance, uh, to go on the last format, just the recent World cup, they'd be losing a third of their teams.

16 of the nations were from Europe.

Um, but you also ha- have to look at the success and profile of those European teams, in that five of the last World Cups have been won by European teams in the men's competition, and the women, half of the six, three, uh, have gone to Europe as well.

Uh, wh- where does this leave, leave us here with the FAI? Do they, uh, fall in line with UEFA automatically? Uh, could they take any separate stance?

John, I suppose the big question is, where will this match be played if it is now to go ahead?

Good afternoon, Katie.

So finally, 120 days after the draw was made in February, the FAO have seen sense to confirm that this game won't be played in Dublin, which we all probably suspected all along.

So yeah, moving on to then the alternatives, I think originally the speculation had been hungry, but my understanding is... it's unlikely to be Hungary.

Yeah, that seems with the change in political regime with the Viktor Orban era over, that may not be the case.

So from what I understand, there are other countries that are being considered, likes of Iceland and even Switzerland in sort of mainland Europe.

So I think that's the work that's currently been ongoing in the last few days.

Some focus coming on whether or not RTE should broadcast it again.