FAI chiefs who want €863m to transform Irish football have assured government that the association won’t implode like before.
Chief executive Jonathan Hill and chairman Roy Barrett today published the FAI’s facility investment vision and strategy.
They reckon that sum - over 15 years - will create a ‘modern, fit for purpose football infrastructure and industry’ in Ireland.
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But Hill and Barrett accept some taxpayers will baulk at the figures considering the FAI received substantial state assistance to survive three years ago.
Under former boss John Delaney, the association ended up on life support and needed a Government bailout, in the region of €19 million, in January 2020.
Asked today why the FAI should get this dosh, Hill said: “The FAI is in a very different place and what happened prior to 2019 will never happen again.
“That’s an important point to make. There’s a separation between the general day-to-day running of the FAI and the grants process that all sports look to.
“This is a different ask of government and we believe we have laid out the rationale for the ask in a very cogent way.
“We’ve stated the infrastructure deficit and this is a new debate and conversation we will have with government.”
Of the €863m total requested, almost 60 percent of it - €517m - would come from the government purse
The remainder would be mostly made up by the FAI through their own funding sources which include FIFA and UEFA, private investors and then local project partners.
If granted, €432m will be spent on upgrading grassroots facilities across Ireland with €390m spent on League of Ireland stadia and training bases.
A further €47m would be spent on the national training centre in Abbotstown.
FAI chairman Barrett said: “We can’t attest to what happened under the last management infrastructures (of the FAI). All we know is it imploded around 2019.
“At the time, I absolutely believe it was the right thing for government to step in and stabilise the organisation.
“But if you look over the last 20 years, the reality is as a sport - a leading sport - football was grossly underinvested in compared to the other main sports.”
And Barrett - who is stepping down as chairman by the end of the year - continued: “We’ve spent half of what other countries have done, we’re in the bottom tier.
“Our argument is there should be greater investment in sport and as the largest sport we have the greatest need. That’s historical but also what we view into the future.
“We think we should get the funding, and we believe we’ve a good case to argue that we will get the funding.”
Barrret added: “Any government funding for anything, particularly sport, is going to be emotional. People will have an emotive view, whichever sport they are from.
“What we have sought to do is to take the emotion out of it and say, ‘the facilities are poor.’
“We have a sport which has been chronically under invested for a long period of time. If that underinvestment continues we will have all sorts of problems.
“The demand for football and football facilities will (only) get bigger and bigger and bigger.”
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