The Government's decision to withhold visas from the Yugoslavia squad for Saturday's scheduled European Championship Group Eight qualifying game at Lansdowne Road has left the FAI in limbo over their future in the competition.
The Government's action, unprecedented in the history of the championship, was taken after UEFA rejected pleas by Sports Minister Jim McDaid to postpone the fixture.
In the short term, the FAI are proceeding with plans for next Wednesday's game against Macedonia on the basis that penalties, if there are any, will not be imposed until the next meeting of UEFA's Executive Committee in Geneva on July 5th.
Yet, the prospect of sanctions down the road cannot be dismissed.
Speaking after yesterday's meeting of EU Sports Ministers in Germany, Gerhard Aigner, UEFA's general secretary, said it was now a matter for their legal team. "There was no legal reason for us to grant a postponement of the game and I am naturally disappointed that we weren't able to reach a resolution of the problem. At this point I am not in a position to speculate on what will happen now."
Among the sanctions open to UEFA are to fine the FAI and/or order the game to be played at a neutral venue with a possible loss to the association of £1.5 million. It is not thought likely, however, that they will award the points to Yugoslavia, although this remains an option. Even less likely is the possibility of Ireland being removed from the competition.
Bernard O'Byrne, the FAI's chief executive, believes that any action other than a decision to re-arrange the game for Dublin would be unfair. "UEFA are angry that the game has been called off, but I think the decision is the right one.
"We will be stressing that a third party made the decision. We didn't ask for it, we didn't look for it. It was made for us and in those circumstances it will be wrong if we have to suffer.
"At the end of the day the Government made the right move, but I stress that at no point did we ask for the Yugoslavs to be removed from the competition. We merely said that this was not the right time to play the game."
Acknowledging that the postponement would impact on the association's finances, he said: "Financial considerations were never at the top of our agenda in this matter, but there will of course be knock-on effects. That aspect will be considered in due course."
Predictably, the reaction was somewhat different in Greece where the Yugoslavs have been preparing for the game since Monday. "We are very disappointed," said Branco Bulatovic, general secretary of the Yugoslav Federation, who heard the news while the players were out training.
"The FAI asked us to postpone the game on Tuesday and we told them we would abide by UEFA's decision. That was made this morning and now we are told that the Irish Government will not allow us to travel to Dublin.
"We are sports people not warriors - we go to play football not to make war. It is very strange that our women's basketball team are now playing in the European Championship in Poland without any problems. Next week our men's basketball team goes to France - and again, no problems. So why this difference with football?
"One of our officials has been at the Irish embassy in Athens for the last two days trying to get visas. We have booked a charter plan, reserved our hotels - all for nothing. People ask what will happen now. I tell them I just don't know. It is up to UEFA."
Before the Government intervened, the FAI had taken a decision not to publish a programme for the game. This was influenced, in part, by the fact that several pre-booked advertisements were withdrawn.
In spite of the adverse publicity, the game was expected to be a sell-out with over 30,000 tickets already distributed. It is understood that monies for advance bookings will be returned shortly by the FAI.
Yesterday's announcement means that for the fifth time in six months a game in Group Eight has had to be postponed and the path ahead looks more uncertain than ever.
