The crowds are coming. The hype is real. The football, according to Alan Cawley, is not keeping up.
The former Shelbourne midfielder and league winner used his spot on the RTÉ Soccer Podcast to deliver a pointed verdict on the SSE Airtricity Men's Premier Division: the standard of play this season is, in his words, "a little bit concerning." And he's not wrong to say it.
Cawley was at Tolka Park for Friday's seven-goal chaos between Shels and Drogheda United — the kind of match that fills highlight reels but doesn't necessarily reflect well on either side's defensive coaching. His takeaway wasn't excitement. It was unease.
One good game a week isn't enough
"I've seen some poor displays, poor games," he said. "You want games to be of a high standard as well. Of course, there is the interest that's there, the hype is there. But we have to back it up with quality."
He was quick to acknowledge the bright spots. The first half between St Patrick's Athletic and Bohemians drew praise from co-host Richie Towell. Shamrock Rovers against Bohemians the previous week, Cawley admitted, was a genuinely good game of football. But isolated brilliance isn't a standard — it's an exception.
"You can't have just one good game every few weeks," he said. "We need to see it across the board... not just with one game every week."
That's the real problem. The League of Ireland has done the hard work of rebuilding its public profile — attendances are up, media coverage has grown, the commercial picture is healthier than it's been in years. All of that momentum is fragile if the product on the pitch doesn't hold its end of the deal.
A technical deficit that's hard to ignore
Cawley pointed to a lack of technical quality as a root cause, and that's a structural issue, not a week-to-week blip. If only one or two clubs in the division are consistently producing watchable, competitive football, the league's ceiling — both as a spectacle and as a market for informed betting — stays frustratingly low.
Title odds in a league dominated by one or two teams tend to compress fast, and right now the gap between the top and the rest looks wider than the scorelines suggest. That's not a great sign for a competition trying to prove it belongs in a higher conversation.
"It disappoints me," Cawley said. "And I don't say that in a kind of disrespectful way."
He doesn't need to be disrespectful. The concern is legitimate enough on its own terms.
