Leave Alone!

I'm having to write my wee piece a day early this week, because the I.F.A. in their wisdom (now that's a joke, as the I.F.A. and wisdom are strange bedfellows to say the least), decreed that the C.I.S. cup final should be played on a Saturday, therefore making teams not involved in the final ( only 14 teams, talk about the 'tail' wagging the dog), play their games scheduled for this Saturday at another date, in most cases this Friday night. This of course is the 2nd Saturday disrupted for the 'final' as the previous one was washed out and by a strange quirk of fate the weather forecast for this weekend is pretty dismal and there's a fair chance the game will fall foul of the weather again. I would laugh, but the I.F.A. are liable to disrupt yet another Saturday for us long suffering fans and I for one have had enough. Hopefully if the game is postponed again they will this time opt for a midweek kick-off, but I won't hold my breath. That other 'old chestnut' came to the fore last night, an all-Ireland football team. I personally hope this never happens and hopefully it won't in my lifetime, as I doubt if many players from our wee province would make it into an all-Ireland team. We would probably see the same thing happening as does in the rugby team, where two or three Ulster players are selected to keep the fans quiet and even if they are the best players in their position, there's no guarantee they'll get to start. Mark Lawrenson even said as much when he reckoned that only three of the current Northern Ireland team would be capable of claiming a place in an all Ireland side. Mark is a self proclaimed expert, yes admittedly he was a top class defender in the 'glory days' at Liverpool, but since retiring from the game he has become a professional pundit, but not a manager. If he knows so much about International football, why is he not putting his name in the frame for the vacant Republic of Ireland job. I'll tell you why, he'd much rather sit in a nice warm studio and enthuse about the great 'Wayne Rooney' or whimper on about Michael Owens latest injury crisis and by a strange twist of fate these two players play for England, who were swept aside by a team who, according to Mark, could only manage 3 players for an all-Ireland side. While us folk here in good old Norn Iron have got breath in our bodies, we'll not be dictated too by the likes of Mark Lawrenson, so take a bit of sound advice Mark and just leave us a alone!