Harry McCue retires in July. Not from playing, no that ended at Australian club Warringah Dolphins in 1991 after a respectable League of Ireland career yielded two titles with Athlone Town in the 1980s.
Not from management either, no that ran its course after guiding Drogheda United back to the Premier Division in 2002 before assisting former Republic of Ireland Under-21 manager Noel King.
This summer McCue steps away from life as an FAI-ETB (Education and Training Board) coach and co-ordinator, and his parting gift on the state of Irish football is clear.
“I feel the FAI have given up the ghost to GAA schools,” says McCue. “The rugby have their [private] schools sewn up as well.
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“What I am saying is: let’s target one school in each area around the country. Get a development officer in there, training every day and create soccer specific schools in different parts of Dublin and in Galway, Cork, Limerick.
“Start off at 11 or 12 years old, so we know the best players entering secondary school and they can go into academies around the country at 16.
“But our big issue is the schools – the FAI have totally neglected them in the last couple of years,” he claims.
“There is no development officer in the Cabra area for the last three years. From Cabra all the way down to the northwest inner city. Same in Lucan schools, where I live, there hasn’t been a replacement appointed in four years.
“These are football fanatical areas that have produced many full internationals but they have no development officers and I just want to know why?”
The FAI have a different long-term strategy, which has yet to be laid out in detail by director of football Marc Canham, despite the 40-year-old’s appointment in June 2022.
“The FAI want the clubs to develop players which is nonsense,” McCue continues. “The clubs do not have the time, they do not have the personnel.
“What we proposed [to Canham] is soccer-specific schools. Exactly what the rugby do – they have their training every day, their gyms in the schools and they have a direct path into the Leinster academy since 2004.
“And they have full-time coaches in their schools who are well paid.”
Underage rugby in Ireland is funded by the IRFU and the private schools themselves with assistance from wealthy past pupils and parents.
The FAI’s academy development plan does intend to introduce “performance schools” in each region of the country but like everything, due to the €40 million net debt, it is dependent on inward investment.
The League of Ireland’s academy systems need funding from the FAI, the Government and each club gaining access to private investment.
McCue knows the FAI will not create a central system similar to what Northern Ireland’s IFA rolled out at the University of Ulster, Jordanstown and he believes education of talented teenagers will suffer as a result.
“I understand Roy Barrett’s numbers – 12 clubs, €500,000 each a year – but trying to police and ringfence that is an absolute nightmare. Does each club have the staff, the facilities and the wherewithal for education? They just don’t.
“The ETB is exactly what an academy should be; a centre for educational training and learning, but no one recognises that. We do a Leaving Cert here and there are 10 ETBs around the country.
“The club academies are not proper academies, they are player nurseries. An academy prioritises education, and that is exactly what the ETB does.”
Shamrock Rovers do facilitate their current transition year students at Roadstone and they have a history of paying secondary education fees at Ashford College for past players like Gavin Bazunu.
“At the moment I’ve half a dozen kids here who are out of the Under-19s league and they won’t get a club next year,” McCue adds.
“It’s wrong. It’s too restrictive for lads. Our proposal is an Under-23s league. I’ve had Chris Forrester, Enda Stevens and Matt Doherty here, and they all played Under-21 club football. They didn’t graduate to the first team at 19 before they went away.”
