Sinclair Armstrong wanted to deck the player who allegedly racially abused him last month.
But the Ireland Under-21 ace is proud of himself for showing restraint despite being riled by the incident.
Ireland’s friendly clash with Kuwait in Austria was abandoned after an hour on June 19, when Jim Crawford’s players walked off the pitch in protest.
A number of Ireland stars claimed a racist taunt was aimed at Sinclair by an opposition player and it was immediately reported to the match officials.
Ireland boss Crawford then supported his players’ decision to leave the field of play and the FAI have since reported the matter to FIFA and UEFA.
The Kuwait FA rejected claims of racist abuse and claimed the game was abandoned due to ‘excessive roughness and tension between the players.
But Armstrong, 20, has now broken his silence on the matter and revealed that he wanted to punch the Kuwait player involved.
Speaking on the Training 121 podcast, the QPR ace said: “When it was said, I kind of froze. I had never experienced racism on the pitch.
“I remember going out to warm up. It was me and (team-mate) Killian Phillips. He was right beside me. The lad made a gesture and me being me, I just laughed.
“Then he said what he said and I looked at him thinking, 'There’s no way he just said that’.
“It was kind of like the devil and the angel on my shoulder. Should I go and punch him? Or calm yourself and see what happens.”
The Dubliner continued: “My initial thought was just get the linesman involved. He was all the way down there, so obviously, he didn’t hear anything.
“I called the linesman, ‘Did you hear what he said?’. Then Killian was going mad, more mad than me.
“He went over to the lad. Everyone was like, ‘Killian, calm down, what was said?’ Killian said what was said, our bench got up and their bench got up.
“But I am proud of myself because I know I could have hit him. There was no one stopping me from hitting him.
“But I just thought, if I hit this lad, I’m not going to get anything out of it. He had already said what he said. I have already heard it.
“I’m proud of myself that I didn't hit him and just dealt with it the way I dealt with it - by just telling the linesman, ‘He said this’ and telling the gaffer, ‘He said this’.
Armstrong wants to see more education in the fight against racism and added: “You can't be saying this sort of stuff on the pitch.
“It happens again and again but I hope I see change. We have to talk about it. Hopefully, we do see change.”
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