Reforming FAI: Is it a case of people before principled process?
Twenty-five years ago, this week, football in Ireland was on a high with the men’s national team having just returned from its second FIFA World Cup. In contrast, our rugby union team was in the middle of one of its poorest decades in history, never finishing outside the bottom two of the then Five Nations.
As elite rugby union became “open” in 1995, the IRFU struggled initially to come to terms with professionalism. And yet, within a decade, and for the first time since 1985, a Triple Crown was won. Since 2004 – the year in which John Delaney would become caretaker CEO of the FAI - much success at provincial and international level has followed for Irish rugby.
Last week, in a slick video presentation, the IRFU announced that it had grown its revenues to over €87.5 million for the financial year 2018/19, an increase of €1.8 million on the corresponding period last year.
The record revenues resulted in part from the sale of additional 10-year tickets and corporate boxes at the Aviva Stadium and were boosted by exceptional income of €25 million from the sale of land in the Newlands Cross area of Dublin last November.
The IRFU is in robust financial health.
Even the normally sombre tones of Chief Executive Philip Browne could not hide the (justified) satisfaction in stating that the IRFU’s surplus will allow it to subsidise its latest strategic plan “Building Success, Together” to further help grow the domestic game, male and female, into the future. Last financial year alone, the IRFU devoted a record amount of €11.25 million to such investment.
In concluding his summary of the IRFU’s financial report, Browne pointedly noted that: “These revenues come from loyal supporters, partners and Sport Ireland, who provide the funding for the development of every aspect of the game. We are extremely grateful for such support.”
The IRFU’s slick presentation of its accounts - including judicious monetisation of corporate ticketing at the Aviva, wise property investment, and continuing positive relations with Sport Ireland and its sponsors - is in stark contrast to the FAI.
Any video presentation of the FAI’s accounts for 2018/2019 could only feature a blank, soundless screen as the FAI will apparently not be in a position to present its accounts to its AGM at the weekend.
Sale of corporate boxes and long terms ticket packages at the Aviva has been a drain on, rather than a driver of, the FAI’s finances.
As the IRFU saw its investments in property grow; the FAI cut staff pay.
The FAI’s relationship with Sport Ireland may be recovering but state funding for football, our biggest participation sport, remains, in effect, suspended.
And when it comes to sponsors, one of the most recent commercial deals entered into by the FAI (in March) was a partnership with a gambling firm, Sport Pesa, a betting platform whose online activities in countries such as Kenya attracted significant and adverse media exposure last week.
Returning to the governance reforms passed at the FAI’s EGM at the weekend and, although a welcome start, the passing of such reforms does not take away from the fact that the farrago at the FAI, in the aftermath of media revelations relating to an alleged personal loan given by the CEO John Delaney, is likely to get much worse before it gets better.
Multiple investigations relating to auditing and corporate enforcement continue. When accounts are eventually prepared and presented, it may well be that the financial viability of football in Ireland will have to be guaranteed by UEFA.
Embattled caretaker CEO, Noel Mooney, has Sport Ireland and the responsible minister, Shane Ross, shouting in one ear about corporate governance; and FIFA shouting in his other ear about governmental interference in the sport.
The position of Mooney, officially on a six-month secondment from UEFA to work as the FAI’s “General Manager for Football Services and Partnerships” – has itself attracted criticism relating to his comments at the FAI AGM of 2017 when as a keynote speaker he told attendees: “the FAI is one of our most progressive and well- run federations…it really is a super federation and you can be proud of yourselves, the board and all the members here.”
Gelatinous sycophancy is, unfortunately, a feature of the politics of sports administration globally, and especially among the ambitious, young football “executives” of UEFA. Mooney’s remarks in 2017, made in front of his mentor, John Delaney, must be seen in this context.
What is much more important is what Mooney does now in the interim for Irish football.
More importantly still, will be the talent, skills and resilience of the next full-time CEO of the FAI – an appointment that will be one of the most important in the game’s recent history.
It is one thing for a sports governing body to reform its processes, but such procedures are generally only as effective as the quality of the people who implement them and uphold the integrity of their office in word and deed.
Already Sarah Keane – the Guus Hiddink of Irish sports administration - and who has revitalised and reformed both Swim Ireland and the Olympic Federation of Ireland, had been mentioned as a possible candidate to do similar at the FAI.
Returning to the incumbent caretaker CEO of the FAI and Mooney’s, if it was his, decision to ban the media from a large part of the weekend’s EGM, where the discussion was principally on corporate governance, was disappointing. Ironically, it was also totally at odds with the basic principles of such governance – transparency and accountability.
It was also indicative of an organisation that remains, at times, tone deaf to public opinion. Questions by previous auditors or at AGMs did not precipitate the current travails at the FAI; good investigative journalism did. Limiting the access of such journalists is of limited long-term value to the FAI.
As for the governance reforms themselves – all 78 of them – they are far from radical and are in fact are almost totally derivative of reforms that other football associations (including here in Australia) have undertaken in recent years.
This is not a criticism of the review group that put them together and did so with alacrity and authority. It is more to say that the very fact that such a basic array of governance principles has been labelled “reforming” tells us a lot about the previous state of the FAI.
