They need me more than I need them

Ah, my favourite subject...

I think these quotes could be pretty accurate alright.

I’ve defended Stephen Ireland on here many, many times.  And I have no doubt that he was ‘bullied’ within the squad – this should never ever have been allowed to happen.  Bullying is not a matter which can be trivialised and people can take the ‘he’s a big boy, he should be able to take it’ stance until they’re blue in the face but the fact remains that people react to this sort of thing in different ways.  Ireland has been badly scarred from his time in the Irish squad and to think that we have lost our best player since Roy Keane because some tit was allowed to pick on him ‘til his heart was content is quite frankly, a f**king disgrace.  This was, after all, our best player in years.  Why didn’t someone step in and knock this on the head (yes, you Delaney and all those f**kwits that work with you in the FAI).  Don Givens is also a disgrace and undoubtedly hammered another nail in Ireland’s coffin when he made unwelcome comments about him when he was caretaker manager.  Hunt also did the same, the stupid twat.  Neither of these men spoke on behalf of us, the fans.  Deep down, we all wanted him back in the green shirt.  It seems now that that will never happen and I personally blame the aforementioned Gives and Hunt for this.  I’m not convinced Stan had much to do with this but this is as I think that, despite being a sh*t manager, Stan wasn’t/isn’t a bad chap at the end of the day.

This situation, however, took a dramatic turn for the worse this week when Ireland said he would rather practice martial arts than play for his country – even those in the pro-Ireland camp like me and Eamon Dunphy  et al have to now concede that this matter is now dead and buried.  He will never play for Ireland again.

I do believe that Stephen Ireland disrespected our great nation and the Irish fans with all that martial arts sh*te before declaring the decision to ‘retire’ was the best he ever made.  Why didn’t he come out like a man and tell us exactly what happened – show those people who forced him out for what they really are?  He didn’t but instead punished a nation for the wrong doings of a few.  For this reason, I will no longer be championing his cause anymore.  I don’t care what happens him at City – I hope when the next manager comes in at City (let’s face it, Hughes loves him) and casts him aside for some swarthy, exotic, £4o million player, he doesn’t come crawling back to us when he finds himself a bit-part player at Sunderland.  ‘Cos I think we’ll all happily say ‘f**k off Stephen, you turned your back on us when we needed you most’.