Freshly unsealed documents from the Irish National Archives in Dublin and reported by PA Media, state that Blair attended a meeting with the nationalist Social Democratic and Labour party (SDLP) leader, Mark Durkan, alongside the Northern Ireland secretary of state, John Reid, to discuss policing and a recent criminal justice bill.
Blair proposed SDLP Irish nationalists support England at World Cup, papers show Unsealed documents show British PM’s idea in 2002 did not go down well with Northern Ireland politician.
And the day after the exit, according to newly unsealed documents, the then UK prime minister, Tony Blair, suggested in a meeting that nationalists in Northern Ireland could now support England.
On entering the room, Blair is said to have commiserated with Durkan over Ireland’s defeat and “offered, apparently genuinely, that the SDLP were now supporting England”.
Nine days before the team’s first match in the tournament, hosted by Japan and South Korea, its captain and talisman Roy Keane was on his way home before a ball had been kicked, after publicly berating his manager, Mick McCarthy.
