Duffer didn’t give a damn about that though.
As long as he was doing a job for the Republic of Ireland on the pitch, it didn’t really matter that he was singing God Save The Queen at the top of his lungs. It didn’t even matter if he may have wanted to represent England instead.
Some people love to get caught up on things like this and preach that they’re some of the most important things in the world, but in reality and in sport, the most important thing is what happens on the pitch.
And if somebody is doing better than the next person would where and when it matters, then there’s no point in crying about it.
Damien Duff had his say on the Declan Rice debate in the RTÉ studios on Tuesday night. He’s a proud Irish man and it hurts him that Rice has to take time to make up his mind but he knows that just like back in his time, we can’t afford to be high and mighty about all of this.
Beggars can’t be choosers and we’re just going to have to roll with the punches and take all of this on the chin. Declan Rice was our best player in the three games he’s played for us and even though it could have been handled better, there’s nothing we can or should do other than hope he chooses to play for us after all.
And Duffer referenced a great story from his time in green where one of his teammates would sing the English National anthem on occasions.
The blonde bomber knew this teammate wanted to play for England, so did everyone else and though it irked them slightly they got on with it because he stood up in green on numerous occasions.
“I won’t name any names, here, but I used to play with a player – for 40 or 50 caps he was with me, and I remember we all caught him rapid singing the English national anthem. Did we have a problem with it? Yeah. But I still wouldn’t change it because he brought a lot to the Irish team for, I dunno, five, six, seven, eight years.“You won’t get the name out of me, but he obviously wanted to play for England, he played for Ireland, and he brought an awful lot of happiness to our country,” said Duffer.
Damien Duff insists that Declan Rice should be welcomed back to the fold if the West Ham man opts to continue his international career with Ireland #rtesoccer #declanrice pic.twitter.com/mf0PIbFxva
— RTÉ Soccer (@RTEsoccer) August 28, 2018
Duffer’s comments about his old teammate singing God Save The Queen drew plenty of speculation on social media, and a whole host of them surmised that the man he was talking about was the Matty Holland.
The fact that Roy Keane had wrote the following about Holland in his autobiography probably feeding those claims.
And the jigsaw was pieced together.
Matt Holland. https://t.co/vMqKL6ynaI
— Rob Smith (@robsmithireland) August 28, 2018
https://twitter.com/fabster9/status/1034528067396530176
https://twitter.com/CCFRR/status/1034525534435377152
“I once caught an Irish player rapid singing the English National anthem.” Said Damien Duff. He won’t name the guy but says he played over 50 times for Ireland and brought much joy to the country. My money is on Matt Holland. #secretsasannach
— Richie Conroy (@richieconroy) August 28, 2018
Me thinks Duffer is speaking about Matt Holland singing the English National Anthem. https://t.co/vpWPCJSUUE
— Shane Browne (@skepticfella) August 28, 2018
