r/coybig

Watching Pico Lopes at the World Cup has genuinely made me question whether we massively undervalue League of Ireland players when it comes to the Ireland squad.

He’s spent the majority of his career in the League of Ireland, yet he played every single minute of Cape Verde’s World Cup campaign and looked completely comfortable against some of the best players in the world.

I’m not saying every top LOI player should automatically be in the Ireland squad, and Pico is clearly an exceptional player. But surely pico has showen we should be considering these guys more and try not hold a bias against the league.

It often feels like we’ll favour players who are barely getting minutes in England over players consistently performing at a high level in the LOI.

Has Pico’s World Cup changed your view on whether League of Ireland players deserve greater consideration for Ireland, or is he the exception ?

Went around in circles with the lads over a few pints on this last night, most people just felt this was exceptional circumstances and shouldn’t change anything.. I didn’t agree!

I'm sure as we all know, Ireland isn't exactly the best national team, and isn't as good as it once was. There are multiple reasons as to why that is the case, but this post isn't about that.

This post is about suggestions to help improve not only the national team, but also the league of ireland, grassroots and youth teams.

In my opinion, there is a clear country by which we should be looking at and aspiring to be, which is Croatia. Similar sized population, similarly good at multiple sports, but still, a country that has generated a consistent number of top quality players, often developed locally before moving on to better leagues, and have performed pretty well at tournaments to say the least.

Ideally for this thread, I would like solid suggestions instead of doomeris, as I don't really think that's productive

Reading "inverting the pyramid" and it reminded of this article. I'm starting to go down a rabbit hole of Irish soccer history.

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"the FAI enumerate for the first time the potential cost of a boycott, estimating it at a minimum of €5.5 million."

Have to say, after round 1 of matches, I thought we could maybe have done a job in this world cup, maybe got to the last 16 but took a look at the playoff teams final results now that the Bosnians have been eliminated. Doesn't make for great reading.

3 wins across the board, B&H v Qatar, Sweden v Tunisia and Turkey against USA B.

I can see the argument for giving Europe more spots, but I don't think it's massively justified...

Team	GP	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD
Bosnia & Herzegovina	4	1	1	2	5	8	-3
Czechia	3	0	1	2	2	6	-4
Sweden	4	1	1	2	7	10	-3
Turkey	3	1	0	2	3	5	-2