As I indicated earlier, I am taking up Deputy Quinn's suggestion. Everyone in the country still feels sad about last Sunday's match, but 48 hours on, it gets a little better with the team's homecoming. I thank them individually and collectively for the enormous satisfaction and pride they gave to the country over the past four weeks in their preparations for the games and their performance in the four matches. To the officials of the FAI, and particularly Mick McCarthy, the entire panel and everyone on the staff associated with the team's well-being, I give credit, and everyone in the House thanks them. They gave a huge lift to the country and, from the youngest person to the oldest, everyone was a World Cup expert.
Their manner of exiting was heart-breaking, but at the same time, it gave everyone great pride in their achievements. They were not given much chance by the experts of qualifying from their group in the first place. They had to knock out either Portugal or the Netherlands which was not going to be easy, but they knocked out the Dutch, which was a huge achievement. To get through the first round after dealing with the controversy within the panel, about which much has been said, they had to steady themselves and then go into a tough group beginning with Cameroon, a team that was both African and Olympic champions. They had then to face Germany, one of the perennial great teams of the World Cup, and they got a spectacular draw. They were successful against Saudi Arabia before going on to meet Spain, still one of the fancied teams, although it did not look so great on Sunday, but that might change.
I thank them all for what they have done for the country. They did the country proud. They did not get the step up that we all thought they deserved, but that is for the history books. We can celebrate today that we had a team in the World Cup that reached the second round. They were unlucky to go out. They did the country proud.