Football Association of Ireland technical director Shane Robinson has called on the government to deliver "badly needed investment" for the academy system in Tuesday's budget.
Irish soccer's governing body have asked for an initial €4.45 million per year, which would permit League of Ireland clubs operating 26 underage academies (male and female) to hire a minimum of three full-time staff each.
Under the FAI's proposal, that would rise to €8m per year after two years, with the hope that academies would be self-funding through transfer fees of graduates within 11 years.
A recent independent audit, funded by Government, found that youth football facilities here lagged well behind those in other countries ranked 51-100 by world governing body FIFA. The Republic of Ireland men's team are currently ranked 61st and have not qualified for an international tournament since Euro 2016.
Only 4% of clubs here have a full-time head of coaching, as against 46% in equivalent-ranked associations, while no LOI clubs have a minimum of four full-time academy coaches, compared to 36% in the aforementioned FIFA-ranked countries.
"Brexit changed a lot of things in terms of player development," Robinson told RTÉ Sport, referring to the fact that Irish youngsters can no longer sign for clubs in the UK between the ages of 16-17.
"We now have ownership of player development in the country. It traditionally would have been done by English clubs, if we're being honest, which is not a good thing either. Now we have a huge opportunity.
"There are academies, what is lacking is investment. And this is the first step where we're seeking investment. If you said from next week on [that] we could prepare for that, it would provide unbelievable support for the young players, and give us a real roadmap for where we could go.
"The academy system has been built over the last number of years. It is now at a point, where we have Under 14, 15, 17, and 19 boys sections, and under 17 and 19 girls sections feeding into your League of Ireland clubs. We have over two and a half thousand players in the academy system. A really good geographical spread across the country.
"The League of Ireland at the moment is thriving, and the clubs deserve unbelievable respect for what they've done to this point, with little or no investment, but the game badly needs investment.
"[Speaking] about international success, we have to develop players in this country ourselves. So there's an investment proposal gone into the government. Hopefully, in the budget on Tuesday, we will have a good day for Irish football."
"We've never invested in football in this country properly"
The FAI has lurched from crisis to crisis in recent years, and was €70m in debt before a Government-led bailout in 2020. The current debt is €40m but the association is seeking voluntary redundancies as it seeks to further reduce costs.
Less than a fortnight ago, representatives of the FAI only appeared at the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Media, Communications, Culture and Sport after an intervention by Minister for Sport Patrick O'Donovan, who warned that their planned non-attendance was not an option for an organisation that receives a significant amount of taxpayers' money.
Robinson acknowledged that there might be some scepticism about giving funds to the embattled organisation to administer, but he said: "It's not a direct investment into the FAI, it's into the clubs that have worked so hard over the last number of years to build the academy system. It's an investment for the future. It's an investment in children.
"The government asked us to bring in specialists, which were Double Pass, world-renowned auditors, in the football landscape. They've come in, audited every club to this point.
"Trust is earned. I think over the last two years we've met with many ministers, many politicians, Sport Ireland. We've shown we can deliver. We delivered the audit on time. We've shown exactly where we are as a nation on the football in front, we want to invest in the future.
"Football is a massive global industry. We've never invested in football in this country properly. That's a failure on the FAI, but it's also a failure on us as a country and, and now is a chance to properly invest.
"The talent is there. We have an U17s group going to a World Cup in Qatar in four weeks' time. Boys like Michael Noonan who played yesterday, scored two goals against Kerry in an FAI cup semi-final, unbelievable talent. Despite our problems, we have talent to this country. We just need to invest in it."
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