Foot and Mouth fever has taken over and it doesn't look like any football will take place until early April. The FAI must be kicking themselves for not playing the "foot and mouth" card when they were calling off the international with Denmark last week. Instead it was called off because of a bit of ice on the terraces. There were rumours that the stewards were asked to clear the ice, but Union rules state that it isn't their job and they would have had to get time and a half to even set foot on the terrace.

Although we didn't get the pleasure of watching our Scandinavian friends in action, our friends from the North did get to host a Scandinavian outfit. Norway came to "the Fortress" that is Windsor Park. To tell the truth, having sat through two hours watching Eriksson's England easily defeat Spain, I'd had my fill of football and wasn't going to bother watching the Nordies and the Nordics. However, good old Sky News informed me that they lost 4-0 and Celtic's Neil Lennon left the stadium at half time. This I had to see.

As it turned out, it wasn't as bad as Sky made out (nothing new there then). Every time Lennon touched the ball there was a funny mixture of cheering and booing. I'd seen it all before with Anton Rogan and other Catholics who've played for the North. Windsor Park is the home of Linfield FC, so I don't think anyone was surprised considering sectarian songs are commonplace on the terraces throughout the grounds of the Irish League every Saturday. The IFA must cut it out at grass-root level and maybe then it will carry over onto the international scene.

Meanwhile there is a good chance that they'll lose their best player. And who'd blame Lennon. By the way, what are the chances of FIFA allowing Lennon line out for the Republic? To Sammy McIlroy's credit, he wouldn't let the press distract him from his main concern, which was the result. Sammy said he'd heard worse abuse than that (which is true), and that the performance was absolutely rubbish (no arguments there either). It was also a nice gesture to see Linfield's Glen Ferguson playing at international level; he certainly didn't look any worse than the full-time professionals who were playing.

Credit also to RTE on their weekend football coverage. Well that's the first time I ever said that, however RTE decided not to send any commentators to England for their Premiership programme (foot and mouth) and instead did the commentary from the studios. So what's Eurosport's excuse? And Football Italia on Channel 4. They present the programme from the stadium in Italy but obviously do the commentary from the studio! And as for TV3's football coverage, 'nuff said.

On a personal level, the biggest disappointment of the week was the postponement of the FAI Cup quarter-finals between Rovers and Shelbourne. I'm sure that Tolka Park would have been close to capacity, and it would have set the weekend up perfectly to know that the Hoops were safely into the next round of the Cup.

The FAI are getting more press coverage than ever, however I don't think I've read anything complimentary towards them. The credit card scandal is just the most recent of a long line of botched-up operations. Jaysus, I must have forgotten all about that weekend away with the missus, ah sure how much do I owe you, what's all the fuss?

The FAI will decide this weekend whether they are building Eircom Park or jumping into bed with Bertie and Stadium Ireland. I think we should forget all about Eircom Park, let the Government worry about the building of the stadium, and concentrate on football for the next few years. 45 million pounds will go a long way towards improving all levels of football throughout the country.

On a final note, I couldn't help but notice the emergence of the new Irish Futsal team, thanks to a feature about their trip to a tournament in Romania on "the Soccer Show" last week. In fairness they looked the part with all the flashy Irish gear they got from the FAI and some coaching sessions from Brian Kerr and Noel O'Reilly. However, you have to be sceptical when the best player they could come up with was Sean Byrne. And judging by the footage, the Irish lads' goals total from the tournament appeared to be zero.