A not-so-subtle dig.
“Not one day has passed when I’ve regretted it,” Damien Duff declared back in February of this year. “I would have been unhappy with myself if I’d stayed.”
The former Ireland attacker was speaking to RTE, earlier this year, about his decision to step down from Stephen Kenny’s national team coaching set-up.
Duff opted, back then, to keep the reasons private for his decision to step down from his role as assistant to Kenny. He was adamant, though, that he had made the right call.
“I felt strongly about things and I would have been unhappy with myself if I’d stayed, it’s as simple as that,” he commented. “I know it’s not ideal for the manager, but at the same time, it’s a chance for him to bring in a better coach than me.”
During Duff’s time within the Ireland coaching set-up, Kenny came in for criticism over a motivational video that was used to gee up players ahead of a friendly encounter with England. Duff has never spoken about the video, but his comments previewing England’s Euro 2020 clash with Scotland, on Friday, certainly alluded to the incident.
After RTE featured an interview with Scotland’s John McGinn about how his side will approach the England game, Duff said:
“It’s a free hit [for Scotland]. Down at Wembley they will just make it outright war.
“If it was up to me I would definitely make a motivational video as well.”
Defiant Duffer pic.twitter.com/jNsmqaMZay
— John Fallon (@JFallonExaminer) June 14, 2021
Last year, the Football Association of Ireland launched an investigation into the showing of the pre-England motivational video – and into how news of it being aired to the squad was leaked to the press – but found nothing untoward had occurred.
Perhaps the Duff jab will encourage others that were involved to give the full tale of what happened, and how the video’s airing was leaked.
