Panel was at loggerheads over manager

WHEN is a secret not a secret? When it belongs to the FAI's selection panel for a new Irish manager. Containing more leaks than a sieve, the truth, for want of a better word, was always likely to come out.

With the help of a celebrated gaffe and last weekend's latest round of newspaper postmortems it seems even the dogs in the streets now know that two of the selection panel didn't vote for Mick McCarthy.

Two more leaks pointed to a 3-2 vote, one of which more or less confirmed that the two dissenters who voted for Kevin Moran were the association's president, Louis Kilcoyne, and the vice president cum treasurer Joe Delaney. By a process of elimination therefore, it can be deduced that the president elect, Pat Quigley, and the National League president, Michael Hyland, as well as the man co opted onto the committee by the Executive Council, Shelbourne chairman Finbarr Flood, voted for McCarthy.

Then, to compound the suspiciously ambiguous support for McCarthy which began emerging within hours of his appointment, comes yesterday's revelation that the FAI has "blocked" McCarthy's desire to have Ian Evans as his full time assistant, a stance which has already been opposed.

That all of this has emerged in the fallout from Kilcoyne's admission that he did not vote for McCarthy has greatly angered at least two of the five man panel, and maybe as many as three or four. One of them, Flood, currently deputy chairman of the Labour Court and former managing director of Guinness Ireland, yesterday gave vent to that anger when going public with some of his views for the first time since the whole process was put under way and vigorously distanced himself from at least Kilcoyne, and maybe more, of the association's officers.

The picture that emerges is of a panel which not alone was at loggerheads about its choice to succeed Charlton, but also in its mondus operandi. In addition to one officer curiously not taking any part in the process, at one stage another officer was on the brink of resigning in the middle of the interviewing process.

Responding, surprisingly, to the first questions asked of him by a journalist, Flood admitted "I am disappointed at the amount of information that has appeared not just in the last week but over the interview period."

However, the straw that broke the camel's back as far as he was concerned was the withdrawal of an agreed statement expressing the panel's support for McCarthy the day after Kilcoyne's revelations.

I don't believe it was sufficient to say that Mick McCarthy was rung on behalf of the association. There was a more fundamental need than that, indicating total confidence for the new manager quite clearly. Even people who know nothing about football were asking what the hell was going on?

"In fact there was to be a statement on behalf of the interview board on these lines the day after the comment was made. This statement was stopped by the president.

"There was an agreed position, if anyone was asked, about the voting arrangements on the interview panel, and that was the normal one in these circumstances. While it may not have been unanimous with the number of people voting that was unlikely anyway there was total support for the decision. That was to be the strategy. Full stop. That was agreed."

When it was pointed out that Kilcoyne has been praised in some quarters for his honesty, Flood replied "That I find very disquieting. I find that extraordinary."

It was also endemic of the sieve like leaks from the selection committee. "At one stage," claims Flood, "RTE radio and RTE television were putting out two different angles simultaneously, presumably from official sources.

Asked whether he was a lone voice of protest.or reflected general disquiet within Merrion Square, Flood said "I can certainly tell you that one other member of the interview panel threatened to resign during the interview on the basis that he was unhappy about comments appearing in the papers in relation to individuals at interview which he felt could only come from a member of the group. So certainly there was one other member of the group who was very unhappy."

Flood was also angered by reports in last week's Sunday Times "commenting on phone calls to my house, or power broking and all the rest. However not one journalist has rung me to ask me anything about the interview process.

"The other thing that resent very strongly is the rubbishing of the system of interviews and the job spec. Not one of the candidates had a problem with the job spec. The Sunday Times had a comment from someone that the manager would have to run from Donegal to Kerry to do it. Anyone with any knowledge of a job spec knows that it would require a structure involving other people and that the resources would have to be there."

"In relation to the interviews people talk about the time lag to get it. If you look at the English manager's job (when Jimmy Armfield was appointed as a consultant in the lengthy process of appointing Terry Venables to succeed Graham Taylor) that took far longer. We actually selected a manager four weeks ahead of the stated target, which was the end of February."

Flood, who refused to disclose how he himself voted, rejects the claim that the process was a circus. He claimed "The circus arose as a result of the information to, and speculation by, the press. The other thing that damaged the interviewing process was the presence of the TV cameras at the Marriott Hotel, and how they came to be there is anybody's guess."

In the fall out from the selection process for a new Republic of Ireland manager, Flood cites "a lack of professionalism" which in turn has been "extremely damaging for the association. I have to say that Mick McCarthy's extremely dignified response to Pat Kenny, when asked about the president not voting for him, I thought was in stark contrast to the image projected by the association in the media."

Indeed, already revealing a far greater work ethic and appreciation for his job spec than his predecessor, McCarthy trained with Shelbourne last night and, in contrast to the less than full backing of some of his fellow administrators, Flood is wholly supportive of the new man.

"I believe he's a man of the highest integrity, very straight and hard working. If anyone can do a good job for Ireland he will. He would have the total support of myself personally, and Shelbourne Football Club. We've had a lot of dealings with him and we see him as a first class individual."

Johnny Giles, who knows a thing or two about all of this, has commented that the last couple of months constituted a return to the "amateurish" bad old days. That there still remains a need for one of the selection committee to express support for McCarthy is probably the most damning indictment of the whole process.