Watch live: Ireland players ‘have been thrown under the bus by the FAI’ over Israel matches, committee hears

Ennis asks if the numbers from the straw poll had been flipped, would the FAI have called the game off? It’s an interesting question but Courell swerves it.Daniel Ennis subs in for Sinead Gibney. He asks about the vote between the players on Saturday morning. Who called it?“It was the players themselves. Maybe including the staff. Certainly not the executive.”Ennis: “Nine players did not want to play...”Courell goes into the timeline again, rehashing what people mostly already know.“One player said: ‘I’ve changed my mind, Gaffer.’ The players had a straw poll. That was not what decided whether to play the game. The FAI decided to play the game.”Byrne asks Courell where the concerns for player welfare were over the weekend. Courell: “I note that you were watching from home. The reality was that in the environment where we were, player welfare was paramount. No player travel alone... We are very satisfied that we wrapped around the player in question [Gavin Bazunu hasn’t been named here but it’s accepted that’s who he’s talking about]”Cooke takes the opportunity to talk about the 68 per cent who voted for the game to go ahead. It’s an easy out for him. She asks him where his leadership was over the weekend. He falls back on the vote.Cooke replies that he was there, he did an interview after the game, as he did after the EGM. Byrne starts talking about bubbles and ivory towers, letting Cooke slightly off the hook here. She’d be as well to make him answer a question.Byrne asks Paul Cooke of he was “for real” in saying he thought the FAI handled the events of last week quite well. Joanna Byrne: “I do believe there have been catastrophic failures from the FAI in terms of leadership over the past few months.”The issue of sanctions for missing the game comes up.Courell: “The challenge we have with regards to Uefa’s decision making on a rule breach is that it’s subject to a disciplinary hearing. So if I talk to someone in Uefa and ask what the probably sanctions are, they can’t say because they don’t know. It’s an independent committee who decides.”Back to Israel. Courell says the FAI have had upwards of 20 meetings with Uefa in the past year about the game.“It’s fair to say Uefa are sympathetic to the situation we found ourselves in. But they have to make their decisions int he context of the 55 members of their organisation.”Byrne returns to a question posed by Ní Chuillin regarding his refusal to answer questions about historical abuse cases. Other FAI officials have answered questions on it at past hearings but Courell continues to say he doesn’t want to prejudice Garda investigations. Chairman Kelly takes a dim view of his stance.Malcolm Byrne is up now. He asks Sport Ireland and the Department of Sport if they have governance concerns about the FAI and both replay that the FAI have made improvements.Ní Chuillin: “There are three concerns so far in this meeting.”Courell: “I’m not sure what the concern is.”Ní Chuilinn: “The concern is that a man in a towel and nothing else came into the team room. The concern is that the Ireland women’s team, with quite a few young players, were stalked and harassed and the police were called. The concern is that Aoife Rafferty has no memory of what must have been a quite striking conversation.”Ní Chuilinn brings up an incident in Budapest in 2023 when the Ireland women’s team were stalked and harassed and police were called. Aoife Rafferty says she’s aware of the incident.Ní Chuilinn: “Do the women’s team have security with them on international trips?”Courell: “They do. It was doubled in 2025.”Evanne Ní Chuilinn asks if any coaches who find themselves officiating at matches might not be Garda-vetted. John Martin says he doesn’t know but will find out.Senator Alyson Comyn is back to safeguarding and asking about referees. She presses John Martin about a guarantee that all referees from the past four years have been fully vetted. Martin says he can’t say it for certain.Courell: “This is a very specific area. We came in here expecting to answer questions on one area...”Alan Kelly: “This is about safeguarding. This is part of it.”Courell: “We can give a guarantee that all 1,400 referees in the system are fully vetted.”Comyn: “And for the past three years?”Courell: “I would have to revert on that.”Brennan: “The players have been thrown under the bus by the FAI. And the FAI have been thrown under a juggernaut by UEFA. Why is that?”Courell: “It’s simply because Uefa is a 52-member organisation. Sentiment is high in Ireland with regard to this issue but there are 51 other members.”“A lot of questions there Deputy,” says Courell, “is there any one area you’d like me to address?” He goes on to say it’s not for the FAI to dictate government policy.Brian Brennan (FG) is asking about the Israel game now. He asks what supports Gavin Bazunu got, who decided that the call to play would be left to the players and what happened during the game. He also asks about the timeline over the past year around the game. He’s grandstanding a bit now, talking about his own trip to Gaza and the kids playing football over there, very much getting into comment-not-a-question territory...O’Sullivan asks if all referees in Irish soccer are Garda-vetted. John Martin assert that is the case. O’Sullivan asks if this was the case three years ago, Martin replies he’ll have to look into it. O’Sullivan asks why the FAI’s safeguarding officer isn’t here. CEO David Courell points out that the association’s four most senior executives are here.Chairman Alan Kelly (Labour) opens the meeting and we’re underway. Pádraig O’Sullivan is the first TD up. “Welcome everyone, here we go again...”Welcome to the Irish Times liveblog of the FAI’s appearance in front of the Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Communications, Culture and Sport. Proceedings will get underway in the next few minutes - all the main protagonists are in the lobby outside Committee Room 1 for now. As soon as they’re called in, we’ll let you know.