FAI meet FIFA over player eligibility

The FAI have held talks with FIFA over the eligibility of ten eircom League of Ireland players following the new ruling which forbids players from playing for more than two teams in 12 months.

FIFA initially informed the FAI that no decision could be made before the middle of next week.

However, following further submissions and given the urgent nature of the situation, they resolved to attempt to have some cases ruled on this Friday.

Eircom League of Ireland director Fran Gavin said: 'We were very pleased with the meeting and hopefully FIFA will deal with some of the cases before Friday, with the others being ruled on by the middle of next week.

'Given the fact that it took twenty days for a ruling to be made on Javier Mascherano before his recent transfer to Liverpool FC, we are grateful to FIFA for attempting to clear ten cases from our league in such a short period of time.

'The cases are now in the hands of a FIFA judge, Mr. Slim Aloulou from Tunisia. We are also satisfied that FIFA now understand the difficulties Article 5.3 throws-up for leagues operating over the summer months.'