The Irish can have no complaints, back when Jack Charlton was their manager you only had to brush shoulders with someone wearing green in Tesco to qualify to play for them.
Tbf, half of Liverpool are Irish, and there's plenty in Manchester and London etc. There's something like 6million people across the UK that have at least one Irish grandparent.
The over reliance on English players declaring for Ireland is a damning indictment of the FAI and the infrastructure here tbh. It's always been a short sighted policy.
Kalvin Phillips’ ranking for England at #Euro2020: Most mins played (360) Most pressures (112) Most succ. opp half passes (81) Most distance covered (43.9km) Most succ. final third passes (36) Most ball recoveries (27) Most succ. long passes by an outfield player (13) Also in the Germany game Phillips made 11 recoveries the most from an England player in a Euros since Tony Adams (13) in Euro '96.
I don't know how I'd feel about that to be honest, sure there are definitely cases where the likes of Whittingham, Rangel and Britton had plenty of affinity and understanding of what it means to be Welsh, with their Welsh children/wives. I've met Leon Britton at a Wales away game. I just think at the time it'd have dominated the squad to be honest, and would have changed the complexion of the international side completely as so many would have. I just think that five years isn't a particularly long time to be at Swansea or Cardiff, to start lining up to Hen Wlad yr Nhadau. In a relatively short period of time we'd have had: Leon Britton Alan Tate Garry Monk Andy Robinson Darren Pratley Angel Rangel Wayne Routledge Andrea Orlandi Nathan Dyer Jay Fulton Kyle Naughton Mark Hudson Peter Whittingham Joe Ralls Sean Morrison It'd have completely changed the side and the squad. I think at the moment the national team are a good representation of the developing nation - bilingual, diverse and representatives throughout the different regions of the nation. I think if we'd have had all of those players it'd be more of a representation of Swansea City and Cardiff City's success. I don't really think our side should be dominating a side that's meant to be representing the nation. Sure I don't think it'd be nearly as big a deal if we only brought in Angel Rangel, Peter Whittingham and Leon Britton who have a greater understanding and meaning of what it means to be Welsh than the likes of Vinnie Jones and Andy Johnson ever did, but if you open that rule up then you're going to get exploitation. Whilst we're speaking of pure fantasy, I'm sure he'd rather he was able to play for Brazil.
Phillips & Rice are great but it took a few games to see it. They press and cover for each other so well and then allow our fullbacks and forward players to do their thing. Maguire has helped coming back because he pushes past them and teams struggle to deal with it. We force teams to play our game with them both playing.
Bale's grandmother is English. His agent has said he tried to persuade him to play for England for commercial reasons when he was breaking through. It's difficult not to let the heart rule the head in the case of Whitts. But overall, as well put by Cotterill49, I think it's probably a step too far and could encourage some dodgy practices.
You've also got to consider the amount of work we've done as an international team to unite and put club differences aside. You don't have to go back too far to have had Wales own support segregated by club allegience, anti Cardiff/Swans songs all game and going to away games keeping where you were from quite. I don't think Tatey would have got the best reception to put it politely and things would have had to of come to a head if our back four was Ash, Monks, Rangel and Tate with Leon just infront of them
It’s been good to see club rivalries largely suspended for Wales games over recent years. Together Stronger and all that.
