State help needed says FAI

EURO 2008: Leading officials of the FAI will meet with officials of the Department of Tourism, Sport and Recreation on Monday in the hope of receiving logistical support from the Government for their joint bid with Scotland to host the 2008 European Championship.

With little time to consider what type of set-up might be best suited to their current situation, the FAI intends to model its side of the bid on the approach taken by the Scots, who have had a full-time team in place since last August.

Key members of that team are civil servants seconded to the association for the duration of the project and a request for precisely the same sort of support here will be high on the agenda of Monday's meeting.

It will be the first meeting between the two bodies since Wednesday's announcement by the Scottish First Minister that a joint bid was the preferred option of the government there.

"The simple fact is that we are snowed under at the moment because of the World Cup," said Brendan Menton, the FAI General Secretary, last night.

"We feel that we are going to need outside help on putting this together because of the pressure of time involved, and the type of support that the Scottish FA have received in this area would be a major help at the moment."

Menton, who met with his Scottish counterpart, David Taylor at an official UEFA function in Porto last night and described the talks there as "informal", admits that the Irish have a great deal of catching up to do and that work needs to start immediately if the bid is to meet the required standard by May 31st.

"We realise that we need to get a joint working group established to get going on this and that is part of the reason that Monday's meeting will be so important.

"We will be staying in close contact with the Scots from here on in, though, and we expect that they will be in a position to give us a great deal of help based on what they have already learned while getting this far."

Mick McCarthy, meanwhile, warmly welcomed the prospect of the Republic of Ireland playing a part in hosting a major championships for the first time, remarking that "the plan is brilliant, it's ambitious and shows a lot of foresight. When I first got involved with the Irish international set up it never would have crossed my mind that we could host a tournament".

The Republic's manager made it clear that he did not intend to be still around managing the team in six years.

"It's light years away and the truth is while I would love to do it, it would be great for me to just watch the championships take place in Ireland as somebody who has both played for and managed the team."

Indeed the priority for both McCarthy and his employers just now is to resolve his current employment situation, with talks between senior FAI officials and McCarthy's representative, Liam Gaskin, on a new contract having apparently stalled earlier this week.

"I know Liam spoke to the FAI on Wednesday but I haven't talked to him since then so I don't know how things went," McCarthy said.

"But," he added, "I enjoy the job more than in the past. I have enjoyed all six years but it has got better and better. So there are no deadlines as far as I'm concerned."