Yvonne McQuillan

UEFA decided not to accept that motion of taking Israel out of the competition and that's kind of where the book stops.

UEFA didn't take this difficult decision and so Ireland have to play that fixture.

They will be fined if they don't.

They will have suspensions and they will have fines.

Their players will be, as I mentioned already, their players will be left without getting to play a match for their country.

And none of this means that people who aren't calling for a boycott are not empathetic to the people of Palestine.

You can't conflate the two.

There is no monopoly here on empathy.

But I don't want our athletes to have to bear the brunt of that.

And they didn't have to do it a few months ago when it was gymnastics.