The Pitch: Could government ‘straight man’ O’Donovan yet save Irish football?

Minister for Arts, Media, Communications, Culture and Sport, Patrick O'Donovan TD. Pic: Sam Barnes/Sportsfile
N Sunday evening at the Aviva Stadium, the new senior minister at the Department of Sport, Patrick O’Donovan, will take his place in the president’s box and watch the Republic of Ireland take on Bulgaria.
O’Donovan has been here before, as a junior sports minister within Shane Ross’ department, which included transport and tourism, a chaotic political ecosystem where you had a rainbow coalition of politicians of polar opposites running separate agendas.