Ireland have decided to fulfil their Nations League fixture against Israel after the squad held a dramatic vote on contesting the game on Saturday.
Sunday’s match in Debrecen, Hungary, was plunged into chaos after goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu refused to feature amid growing backlash over the conflict in Gaza.
Over 17,000 people have signed a petition calling for the Irish to boycott the game, and tensions mounted when the FAI announced a delay to training and a pre-match press conference as crunch talks were held at the team hotel.
But FAI CEO David Courell told reporters that, following a vote, the players have decided to play Sunday’s game.
‘I would like to apologise to the media for the delay and interruptions today. It is a challenging time. The squad was in Pristina yesterday. An extensive conversation took place where the consensus from the group was to travel to Hungary. It was a two hour meeting,’ he said.
‘This morning a player expressed their discomfort to the head coach and indicated their intent to withdraw from the squad. This new variable required time and deliberation for the squad to consider. What preceded was another four hours on conversation, mainly with players but at times with staff and the executive.
‘A lot of positions were presented. We were fully respectful of everyone’s right to have their opinion on these topics.
‘Ultimately, within the last 90 minutes we carried out a squad vote on fulfilling the fixtures. A significant majority [to play] was the result. The association took the decision to fulfill these fixtures.’
Ireland boss Heimir Hallgrimsson confirmed that Bazunu will not play in Sunday’s fixtures, but the remaining squad will train today.
‘This morning was just a change of mind for one of the players,’ he said. ‘All the rest of the players are training today. The balance changed with this, it’s an ongoing discussion. We have not got to a conclusion to this. There will be more discussions tonight and tomorrow. It is a unique situation.’
It was also confirmed that Ireland will not partake in ‘elements of the pre-match ceremony’ although it remains unclear what that entails.
Hallgrimsson had previously stirred controversy after saying his team are ‘playing against genocide’ amid Israel’s attacks on Palestine, where more than 70,000 people have been killed since the war in Gaza began.
Hallgrimsson’s comments sparked an angry backlash from Israeli officials, but there have been growing calls for the game to be scrapped by the Irish public – with a petition attracting over 17,000 signatures.
On Thursday night, Bazunu’s team-mate Jason Knight publicly shared his discomfort at the prospect of facing Sunday’s opponents.
Ireland will play against Israel in Hungary after staging a last-minute vote
The team held crunch talks for four hours after Gavin Bazunu refused to play
‘I don’t think the game obviously should be going ahead but it is going ahead,’ said Knight. ‘We’ll have a deeper talk about it and what that means, we’ll get our thoughts as a group and go from there.
‘It is (uncomfortable). There is obviously a lot of talk and rightly so about the scenario we’re in, but I thought Dara spoke quite well (on Wednesday).
‘It’s a bigger spotlight obviously (around the Israel games) and not focused on the football itself. It’s very, very unusual and none of us have come into this scenario before so we’re learning on the fly as well. So we’ll talk as a group and see what is the best foot forward.’
Defender Dara O’Shea, meanwhile, admitted his side are in a ‘tough position’.
‘As soon as the game was decided by the FAI, the government and Uefa, we were always going to be put in a tough position. We feel exposed, it’s come down to us as such at the end,’ he said this week. ‘We knew that was going to be the case and this was going to come our way. It’s a difficult situation but we understand the severity of it too.
‘It doesn’t really necessarily matter my opinion entirely. It’s about the group’s decision. We’ve got to come together as one and navigate that ourselves. This is obviously slightly different.’
Ireland are due to play Israel twice in the Nations League during this international break with both games played at neutral venues. It remains to be seen whether Israel would be awarded the full six points in the events that Ireland boycotts both fixtures.
Hallgrimsson was set to front the media for the first time since telling reporters last weekend: ‘We’re not playing with genocide, we’re playing against genocide. So, we’re playing against Israel. We’re not playing with Israel.’
The Israeli FA angrily took to social media on Monday to hit back at Hallgrimsson’s comments, meanwhile, when he used the word ‘genocide’ in previewing the upcoming fixtures.
As reports circulated that the Israelis were considering a complaint to UEFA, the Israeli FA posted on X on Monday night: ‘We have contributed to the world and humanity in countless fields, earning an impressive number of Nobel Prizes along the way,’ the post on X stated.
‘Unfortunately, we have not yet found a cure for stupidity, ignorance and hypocrisy displayed by the Republic of Ireland team coach.
‘We’re not playing with ignorance, hypocrisy and stupidity, we’re playing against the coach who embodies them.’
Israel were criticised following their first game of the international break, too, which saw them lose 3-1 against Austria.
Sayed Abu Farchi was sent off in the second-half of his side’s defeat, having taken the corner flag out the ground and mimicked a gunshot, though others have suggested he could have been imitating a snooker shot.
Israel’s Sayed Abu Farchi was sent off on Thursday after mimicking a gunshot following a goal
Fans were left stunned and judged the move to be in bad taste. Abu Farchi protested with Bulgarian official Georgi Kabakov at the time, insisting he should have stayed on the field.
But he was already on a yellow card, and Kabakov opted to show him a second booking, resulting in his dismissal.
Israel manager Ran Ben-Shimon leapt to the defence of the Colorado Rapids midfielder after the game, insisting the celebration is regularly carried out by Abu Farchi without punishment.
‘I’ve seen it before and everyone can check,’ said Ben-Shimon. ‘When this young player scores, in the Israeli national team or the MLS or anywhere he plays, he celebrates in the same situation again and again and he never gets a yellow card about it.
‘He didn’t know about it, this is his way to celebrate every goal he scores. He’s a young player, I’m sure this lesson will stay with him a long time, he made a mistake.’
UEFA rules, meanwhile, suggest the referee was right to show a second yellow card.
They say a player must be booked for ‘gesturing or acting in a provocative, derisory or inflammatory way’. Removing the corner flag is also yellow card worthy.