There has been a greater emphasis placed on developing underage structures in clubs over the last few years. The
kids are the future of every club and need to be looked after in the proper manner.

In this regard, Ringtown are no different to any other club, but for the last five years, they have being building for the future and for this year's edition of 'Maroon & White' we speak to one of the men involved in teaching the young Ringtown gaels the skills of the game.
There is not many better placed than Adrian Moran to pass on all he's learned in the game. As one of the veterans of the club's senior team, Adrian has many years experience in the green and gold striped jersey.
As underage secretary, Adrian is kept busy informing all the youngsters of the various games, but unfortunately last year, the club failed to field at some grades and this is a situation that they are keen to address.
"Certainly that is something we are working on and hopefully we will field in all grades this year, which in itself will be an achievement and improvement from last year," said Adrian.
As stated five years ago, a decision was made to focus more on the younger generation within the club, namely the under-10 and under-8 category and so Adrian along with club chairman Gerry Boylan began the arduous task as establishing numbers at this level.
"At our very first training session we had a total of seven under-8s and 10s there, so we knew that there was a lot of work that had to be done.
"Over the years the numbers have increased and now we would have an average panel of 20 at under-12 and 10s, while at under-8s, there are 27 kids there. So, we do feel that we're heading in the right direction.
"There is a big gap between under-12 and the rest of the grades as numbers are tight there, we had to under-14 team at all last year, but we should be able to field at that level this year."
Adrian admitted that the club were short on people helping to coach their underage teams, and stressed there was a need for more to get involved.
"No question about it, we would love more people to get involved. Last year we had Noel Boyce, Kevin Cummins, John Joe Fagan, Mick Hannon and Noel Delaney giving a hand out and the fact is that we need more. It is important that kids at the younger age level in particular get the proper coaching."
The experienced forward revealed that the County Board have been a great help to them in promoting their underage structure with the set up of blitzes at under-8 and under-10.
"The county board have been very good in helping us and anything that we looked for we got and they are all very approachable. Billy Foley is the Coaching Officer and I have to say he is doing a very good job there. He has changed the face of underage hurling in the county.
"They organised blitzes to take place in each club where eight teams would play in a series of matches at under-8s. The pitch would be divided into four to make smaller pitches and every team would get at least three games. Then the next week they would go to a different club, everyone would get a chance to host it."
Keeping kids interested in the game is one of the key areas to ensuring that they play for many years and Adrian believes that is an area that they have worked on.
"Last year, we brought them off over to Peter Curran's hurley makers for a tour of his workshop and I would like to thank him for the tour he gave us and the kids loved it.
"We also brought the under-10s down to Kilkenny city where they trained at the James Stephens ground and this was a week before the All-Ireland final, so there was a great buzz around.
"It is very important to keep lads interested and make sure that they enjoy the game, otherwise they just won't play. Getting them through from under-16 to senior is the big thing as 16-18 are the ages where many lads seem to drop off.
"We are fortunate that we don't have too many other sports competing for the kids' attention. We get on very well with Castletown-Finea/Coole/Whitehall, while we also get on well with the local soccer team Castlepollard Celtic where James Flynn is over the underage, but he is also interested in the hurling, so there are no problems there."
Last year saw Ringtown retain their senior status for another year and indeed they went on to contest the quarterfinal, where they lost to St Oliver Plunkett's and the general consensus within the club is that they must push on from there.
"Talking to a lot of the lads and the aim is to qualify for the knockout stages at the very least. We have a good young team there. The only concern is that some of the lads may head off in search of work during the summer. I suppose every club is in the same situation at the moment, but the rural clubs seem to be more affected."
Michael John Corrigan is once again managing the side in 2011 and Adrian feels that the goals have been set all through the club for the coming year.
"As I said the senior really want to progress and we want to establish ourselves more in the senior championship. We have three or four young lads coming through from minor this year and they will be a great addition to the squad.
"At underage we want to field at every grade and keep promoting the game of hurling in the area. If we can manage that I think everyone would be happy enough. From the start we knew that this would be a long process, but we're getting there and hopefully we can bring it to the next level." 
 
  
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