But obviously this is regrettable to say the very least.

On a personal level Ronan Seery (Dublin City owner) has been a close friend of mine for a long time. He is one of the honest people in the game. I just think he hit the wall really. It became unsustainable for him. If you look at Dublin City and analyse it in a cold way you can say attendances have been very poor and whatever else but he achieved something that other clubs didn't with his own efforts. He won promotion last season against all the odds having been relegated the previous season.

His commercial dealings were the envy of lots of clubs.

The one thing that didn't happen was he didn't created a fan base. And that is a point that is of major concern across the board.

Attendances are a massive worry. We acknowledge there has been a dip in attendances again this year and that is becoming a trend. But I don't think it's just attendances in soccer, I think if you look across the entire spectrum of sport they are dropping except for very high-profile games. It's something not just the FAI have to deal with.

Maybe that's a social problem because of people working and Ireland's changing face and people's available free time. But we have to look at our own. Eircom League clubs are surviving on a hand to mouth basis. What we have strived to achieve with licensing is that clubs are in some ways stepping up to the mark and to their responsibilities.

If you take the revenue situation in particular, that has improved dramatically because clubs won't get a licence without a tax clearance certificate. So the revenue situation has improved in the last three years. But the worry is that it's the non-football activities that are generating the money, be it sponsorship and directors and naming rights and whatever else. When, bar last year when Cork played Derry and one or two other games, have you seen a packed ground?

It's a concern to everyone involved, not just the FAI and Eircom League but to the clubs throughout the country.

Even when Cork played the Cypriot champions the other week, there was loads of room in Turner's Cross.

We've identified ourselves that clubs aren't doing enough within communities and that is a problem. Therefore, grant aid will be there for all the Premier Division clubs next season to appoint a community promotions officer.

There's also a debate about the benefits of summer soccer too. There is a view, particularly outside of the Pale, that it hasn't worked and attendances have fallen. Dermot Keely (Dublin City's manager up until their resignation from the league last week) made clear his views. But the problem we have with comments like his is that it's not John Byrne or John Delaney that decides we are going to have summer soc0cer. It's the clubs that decide it. We don't make decisions. It's the member clubs that make the decisions and four or five years ago the clubs decided that they wanted summer soccer.

If the clubs want to revert back to winter football, that's a debate that has to take place among the clubs.

There's a tendency with managers in particular to go on and on and say the FAI or the league did this and the FAI or the league did that.

The FAI or the league don't make the decisions. It's the people sitting around the table representing these same clubs. We were criticised for having a break for the World Cup. It wasn't John Byrne that said we'll take time off for the World Cup. It was the clubs. It's not a dictatorship and the clubs have to help themselves as well as us doing our best for them.