Timing, as we know, is everything.
Wednesday evening: “Hello gaffer, I come in praise of the FAI!”
Gaffer: “Huh?”
“Yes, yes, they deserve a scribble to be put online first thing on Thursday morning singing their praises for appointing Carla Ward as head coach of the women’s team, all of which suggests that they have finally reformed in to a well-oiled, super-polished, progressive organisation.”
Gaffer: “Riiiiight. Go on then. But are you sure you won’t regret this?”
“No chance!”
Thursday afternoon.
“Hello gaffer, could you take down that scribble on the FAI reforming in to a well-oiled, super-polished, progressive organisation? Or at least drop it below the baton twirling feature? Getting a lot of lolololol messages.”
D’you know, if Ireland’s opponents down the years had scored as many own goals as the FAI, we’d have more World Cups than Brazil.
Thursday should have been a good day. An exceedingly good one. Ward was being unveiled at the Aviva Stadium at 2pm, and hers is a fine appointment. No guarantees, need it be said, but plenty of promise.
And as a few tweeters noted, she played for Leeds and managed a Sheffield club, so that could be an omen: Olé, Olé, Olé, like, give it a lash Carla.
But two hours before came Colin Healy’s statement. All of which insured that Ward’s unveiling would be dominated by questions about the FAI being anything but super-polished. Certainly, it seems, not in their dealings with the Cork man.
A penny for Ward’s thoughts. She’s dealt with shambolic set-ups in her career before – looking at you, Birmingham City – so she might well have been thinking, ‘what the bloody hell have I got myself in to here?’.
The FAI’s CEO David Courell, and Director of Football Marc Canham, possibly set off for the Aviva thinking this would be a rare enough experience, when they’d be saluted, this time for their hiring of Ward.
Instead it was the same old, same old, the lads having to bat off questions about yet another shambles.
They did, of course, deny that Healy, Eileen Gleeson’s assistant coach, had been “verbally assured” of a contract extension before last month’s defeat to Wales in the Euro 2025 playoffs, thereby resulting in the Cork man turning down the chance to become Cobh Ramblers manager.
As Healy himself acknowledged in his statement, it’s common enough practice for a manager’s staff to lose their jobs when he or she is dismissed, he’s been long enough in the game, as a player and coach, to be familiar with those realities.
But his understanding was that the FAI would continue to employ him, claiming that Canham reassured him that his contract would be extended, even after Gleeson’s departure from her role as head coach.
Whatever the truth about the situation, that it was dealt with in such a slipshod manner, that there was ever any ambiguity about Healy’s position, resulting in him turning down the chance of solid enough employment and a regular income, is grim.
Not to be rude, but yet again, the FAI didn’t know its arse from its elbow.
And that this all happened in the year that Healy lost his wife Kelly to cancer, leaving him to raise two young children alone, is unforgivable. As is the status he has been left in, unemployed with no means to support them.
A couple of weeks back, Denise O’Sullivan took to social media to support Healy, saying she was “disappointed to say the least” about his departure from the Irish set-up. “When a coach of Colin Healy’s calibre wants to stay involved I think it’s common sense to do whatever you can to keep him on. Major loss for the team,” she said.
That was unusual enough candour from a senior member of the team, the bulk of them ever willing to air grievances privately, but rarely in public. That O’Sullivan spoke out, backed up by Caitlin Hayes, was a measure of the respect for Healy and his work with the squad.
And anyone who knows him will tell you that he is a thoroughly decent man, who remained professional and committed despite the very worst that life could throw at him.
It was his representatives Integrity Sport who released his statement on Thursday afternoon.
Integrity? Apt. If only the FAI had displayed some in their dealings with Colin Healy.
