What a coup! We must admit that it wasn’t only the government who was fooled. A number of major businesses were also drawn in. Indeed, so were many members of the public. Was the the FAI’s strategy built around clever, but simple, subterfuge? So simple in fact, that many of the great minds in the country have failed to uncover it. OK, so Eamon Dunphy said that he’d run naked from O’Connell Street to City West if the FAI’s stadium were ever built, but did Eamon actually see through the ruse? Did you?

Those of us who showed an interest may have become pawns in the plot. By discussing it, partaking in market research, and clicking Internet polls on A2Z soccer, we all played our part. You see, everybody thought that the boys in Merrion Square were serious about eircom Park. But perhaps they had seen the light. Maybe they finally realised that asking and then begging the government for help in finding a home was a ludicrous strategy. Sure, come election time, whomever was in power would be only too glad to show an interest, especially if the boys in green were successful. But when it came to putting their money, or rather our money, where their mouths were, well… Don’t you know how expensive these places of sport and leisure are, they would cry.

The FAI’s new strategy seems to have gone something like this. Fed up with being ignored by whatever parties were in the seats of power, the FAI plucked up the courage to go it alone. Suddenly, the FAI started going about shouting how they had gotten some new rich friends who would give them a dig out. These were blue chip allies. The really clever bit was to start all this at a time when an Irish government was proudly proclaiming, nay bleating, about its own stadium plans to be built in their, err sorry, our honor. The denizens of Merrion Street got a real shock when they magnanimously offered the FAI tenancy of their new pleasuredome only to be told “Cheers lads, but we’ve got our own.”

Alarm bells must have rung in Bertie’s palace. What sporting greats would adorn their theatre of dreams? The egg-chasers from Dublin 4 were on board. But sure they only played a few times a season. 80,000 bums on seats would need to be found more often than that. Monster truck racing might work, but could its popularity endure? The fact that the guardians of the country’s highest participation sport would not play ball was a serious matter. But that’s what years of neglect gets you. OK, the FAI have been guilty of being shambolic over the years, but perhaps now they have finally found the courage to stand up and be counted. The reward - an 80,000 seater stadium in which to compete and a commitment from the government to pump £45 million over three years into the sport’s grass roots. Junior players may at last emerge from their pitch side containers to a bright new future. Perhaps they might even be able to have a wash before heading to the pub. Cheers Bernard.