After the second game in 1991, England would not complete 90 minutes against the Irish in Dublin for more than 20 years. The scar of 1995 ran much too deep. There have been no competitive fixtures since 1991, although Saturday’s game at the Aviva Stadium, on the site of Lansdowne Road, is a Nations League match. Officially a Uefa competitive game, albeit of a weaker flavour.
The first game between England and the Irish Republic was in 1946, more than 20 years after the latter’s recognition by Fifa as a football nation in its own right. The Daily Telegraph’s correspondent of the day, Frank Coles, steered well clear of hundreds of years of empire and two decades of partition when he described it simply as a “notable soccer occasion”. Coles saw it thus: “The resumption of international rivalry with the Irish in Dublin after a lapse of 34 years.”
Ireland under British rule competed in the Home Championship every year from 1882 until partition, most often in Belfast. The games continued even through the two years of Ireland’s war of independence. In October 1921, while the prime minister David Lloyd George met Michael Collins in London during a truce, the Daily Telegraph reported preparations for the England team’s embarkation to Belfast by ship.
The English FA’s chief consideration for the October scheduling was nothing to do with the state of the war. Rather the autumn weather, the Telegraph reported, was “more likely to favour a smooth crossing” on the Irish Sea. They had good reason to be wary; a Glasgow to Dublin steamer, the Rowan, had gone down earlier that month after a double collision with the loss of 22 lives.
By 1946, the travel arrangements were of greater sophistication. Two days before the first game against the Irish Republic at Dalymount Park, England played Northern Ireland in the Home Championship at Windsor Park. They won that game 7-2 but beat the Republic only 1-0 with a late Tom Finney goal.
So began a significant rivalry, but one comparatively rarely played. Saturday’s game in Dublin is, including 1995, just the 18th between the two nations. Lee Carsley is the first former Ireland international to manage England, and declined an offer to take the Ireland job earlier this year. Declan Rice is the first former Ireland international potentially to play against Ireland. One expects that one or both will provoke some reaction. Last time out in Dublin in 2015, Raheem Sterling was booed by Irish fans who seemed displeased with his intention to leave Liverpool.