Heimir Hallgrimsson's Ireland Squad for Spain: No LOI Players
Heimir Hallgrimsson will take Ireland to Spain this week without a single current League of Ireland player in his squad – but he insists the domestic game still has a place in his long-term plan.
From Thursday, a 21-man group will gather in Murcia for a week-and-a-half of work, part training camp, part audition. It ends with an official friendly against Grenada on Saturday, 16 May, with a behind-closed-doors run-out against Real Murcia pencilled in beforehand.
It is not a full-strength Ireland, nor is it quite an experimental XI thrown together for the sake of it. Championship regulars whose seasons are over mix with newer faces from England’s second and third tiers. Benfica’s 18-year-old winger Jaden Umeh is among those handed a chance, joined by Lincoln City’s Jack Moylan and others such as Josh Keeley and Aidomo Emakhu.
Umeh, formerly of Cork City, already knows senior football on home soil. That only sharpened the debate around this squad.
The noise has been loud. Calls for Bohemians playmaker Dawson Devoy. For Shamrock Rovers’ 17-year-old midfielder Victor Ozhianvuna, championed publicly by his club manager Stephen Bradley. For someone, anyone, from the SSE Airtricity Men’s Premier Division to be rewarded.
Nobody made it.
Hallgrimsson had warned this might happen. Ireland’s “summer league” status means clubs are in-season and under no obligation to release players outside FIFA windows. The Icelandic coach stuck to that line when he fronted up at FAI headquarters after naming his squad.
“It would have been nice but we would be interrupting the league,” he said, stressing that he was reluctant to strip clubs of key players just to hand out caps. Some of those names, he suggested, could come into the picture when he revises the group for the Qatar and Canada friendlies, which do fall inside an official window.
For now, he believes there is a better solution: January.
He has long argued that a winter camp, built almost entirely around League of Ireland players, should become a fixture of the calendar.
“If they are good enough they will be picked at some point,” he said. “Maybe my answer to that one is we are thinking and I have always said that (a) January camp is the one for League of Ireland players.
“That’s the time when the squad will probably be made mostly of LOI players. That needs to be the next step then, just to help them to be integrated into the national team, and just to make a platform for those players.”
The vision is clear. A dedicated window, away from the weekly grind, where domestic players can step into an international environment without forcing their clubs to pay the price. Hallgrimsson spoke of “positive talks” with the FAI and a need to work with clubs on timing and opposition.
“Doing it this way, leaving out players for the second camp, gives spots where if they’re good enough they are, as all other players are, eligible for that camp,” he said.
Yet the reality is more complicated. A January 2027 camp built solely around LOI players remains an ambition, not a guarantee. The coach is careful not to promise what the association’s finances might not allow.
“It’s a tight budget within the association so we need to be careful where we spend,” he admitted.
But he sees a competitive edge in the calendar that so often draws criticism.
“Given the calendar of the League of Ireland, it makes sense to me. That’s the reasons why all the nations with a calendar like the League of Ireland are doing it. They try to expedite players who they think have potential to become national team players.
“Being in a summer league isn’t all negative because it gives advantages. This is, for me, one of them. People might disagree with me but this is my belief. I will try push it when I’m here because it gives us one extra camp with new faces.
“When I managed Iceland and Jamaica, there were always one or two players who would shine in those environments. From then on, they were in the first teams.”
The debate over the league’s level rumbles on in the background. Last week, RTÉ analyst Alan Cawley raised concerns about the quality of games in the Premier Division. UEFA’s country coefficient ranks the league 31st in Europe. The comparison with England’s League One is never far away.
Hallgrimsson’s answer is measured.
“The games I have seen have been good and bad, so it can be all over,” he said. One standard, with exceptions. He is convinced there will always be a player ready to step up.
“I’m not saying if we pick a January camp with 23 League of Ireland players that all of them will be in the next squad. But there will always be one or two players who can shine and that we like and will be in our minds from then on.”
If the January camp is about potential, the Murcia trip exposes something more immediate: a shortage of emerging options in the middle of the pitch.
The squad heading to Spain contains no fresh faces in central midfield. Every option has already been capped at senior level. For a team in transition, that is a concern.
“We have Andy Moran, Jayson Molumby, Jason Knight, Conor Coventry, all of whom have been with us before meaning that we will be struggling in that area with experience for the next camp,” Hallgrimsson said.
“So that is one area where we might need some experience and have to do double-caps, we will see how we progress.
The ones that have been in our regular squad – Finn Azaz, Will Smallbone, Alan Browne – they are the ones still playing and will be in consideration for the second camp.
“We will see how it goes but we might need to call one or two players up for this squad, but the thought process is to have everyone in for the second one.”
In that context, Bosun Lawal’s absence bites. The versatile Stoke City player, who made his senior debut in March against North Macedonia as a defensive midfielder, looked perfectly placed to bridge the gap between promise and responsibility.
Instead, a hamstring injury has halted his momentum.
“Bosun pulled a hamstring. He would probably be one that we wanted for both camps,” Hallgrimsson said.
“We had already talked to Bosun before he got injured about doing both camps because he is the one we would like to kind of fast forward, same as James Abankwah - hopefully he can do both camps. That’s not the main objective, it is to see all the players use this opportunity to see all the players.”
So Ireland go to Spain with a squad that reflects the coach’s reality as much as his ideals: no in-season LOI players, a sprinkling of youth from abroad, and a midfield that still leans heavily on familiar names.
The real question now is whether that promised January platform for home-based talent ever materialises – and if it does, how many of those players will be ready to turn a winter audition into a permanent place in green.
