Green Shoots - A History of Irish Football

On this week's podcast Kehlan talks to League of Ireland legend Alfie Hale about his footballing life.

Alfie has played for Waterford FC, Doncaster Rovers, Newport County, and Aston Villa and more. He has six league of Ireland titles (including being top goal scorer in a few of them as well) he’s won the league of Ireland as a manager and got Kilkenny City promoted to the premier division as champions of the first division.

In Part one we talk about growing up playing football and what happened when he moved to England to play the game over there.

Thanks to the thousands of you who have listened to the show so far. This week we're rewinding all the way back to our very first show at the start of this year. How did Irish football begin on the Island? Who were the first clubs? Let find out by listening to the origin story of Irish football. We’re only just beginning and with your support we’ll be doing something great things over the next year.

On this week's Green Shoots Kehlan and Gary are talking about the Rep, of Ireland's World Cup adventure in USA '94.

Don’t forget you can listen to us on host of audio platforms including Spotify and Apple podcasts. Where ever you listen make sure to subscribe and turn notifications on for the podcast so you know exactly when new podcasts for the show come out. And share the show on your own social media to network to spread the history and heritage of Irish football.

On this week's podcast Kehlan and Gary discuss the Rep. of Ireland's qualifying campaign for the 1994 World Cup in the United States. It was a campaign that was nip and tuck throughout and went down to the final game of the group. With dramatic twists and turns the campaign all came down to one night in November amidst the backdrop of murder and a circle of violence in Northern Ireland. One nations pride and another's glory hung in the balance.

On this week's podcast Kehlan and Gary talk about Ireland's campaign to qualify for Euro '92. The national team says goodbye to Dalymount Park, while the likes of Denis Irwin and Roy Keane make their debuts. Plus, they look at the players and matches of the campaign that were looking to get the Rep. of Ireland to a third straight major tournament in a row.

On this week’s show Kehlan and Gary are on a new journey as we look at the Northern Ireland international team from 1920 through to 1939. The player that scored 96 goals in a single season and famous victories for the national team in a 2 decade span that is absent of Home Nations tournament championship wins.

We’re at Italia '90 where Kehlan and Gary talk about how we got there, playing in the world cup and Gary will be bringing us some of those incredible fan stories that happened along the way including some espionage in Hungary, the head of the FAI getting arrested and being in Sicily when their much loved hero, Toto Schillaci, scored.

In this week's show Kehlan and Gary talk about the League of Ireland in the 1990s. A decade that saw some crazy last day league champions and leahue title playoffs. Plus shock cup winners like Bray Wanderers, Sligo Rovers and Galway United.

We’re giving you the second part of our great interview with League of Ireland legend Pat Byrne where he talks about his footballing life including playing at Bohemians, Philadelphia Fury, Leicester City, one of the great all-time teams in Shamrock Rovers and managing Shelbourne to a league and FAI CUP.

If you haven’t listened to part 1 you can go back and listen to that first, all about his early childhood and how he developed in the game.

On this week's podcast Kehlan talks with one of the all time greats of the game. Pat Byrne’s journey in football has been varied from Ireland to the United States, to Leicester City and Hearts in Scotland and back home again to play. Success followed him almost everywhere he went. 6 League of Ireland titles, 4 FAI Cups, an English 2nd Division title as player and won the league and cup with Shelbourne and brought KilKenny City into the premier Division too as a manager. This is part 1 of 2 episodes with Pat, the 2nd part to be published in the coming days.