Our Irish initiative is explained in the book Between The Flags. Dick Seddon said we started it because it was relatively cheap recruiting with no transfer fees involved. There's a story in there about some soccer genius who Seddon put up for a while over here to try Aussie Rules and who eventually went to a Premier League soccer giant, wasn't happy there and asked Seddon if he could come back to the Demons to try out some more. Seddon told him 'no way: Arsenal (or whatever club it was) will want a big transfer fee'.
The kid went on to play 100s of games and represent his country. Once he was in a system we could not afford him.
It was an advantage for us because we were first, but everyone is on to it now.