'Kilkenny People'

Inter-county woes belie active club scene

I THOUGHT long and hard about whether I should pen another article on Kilkenny football given the difficult week which the county has experienced.

A trio of heavy defeats against Fermanagh (senior), Louth (under-21) and Laois (minor) once again emphasised the enormous gulf in class between Kilkenny and the rest of the Gaelic football world.

The under-21 game, in particular, created significant media interest, but unfortunately such interest usually arrives on the back of a heavy defeat. It is a futile exercise discussing the under-21 game other than to thank the players and team officials who turned up in Ballyragget.

Once the media started discussing that game, many pundits proffered opinions with little knowledge of the facts. County Board secretary, Ned Quinn gave a robust defence of Kilkenny's position on Saturday afternoon on RTE radio 1.

He was honest in his assertion that the county was embarrassed with the outcome of the Louth game, but he was perfectly correct to challenge one of the other contributors on his knowledge of Kilkenny football. Oh how so many pundits see everything in such black and white terms!

Credit to County Board

The club scene within Kilkenny is far from ideal, but credit must be given to the County Board for the manner in which it has structured a range of football league ties over the first four months of the year.

I was also asked to comment last week on Kilkenny's footballing fortunes on another radio station. Before I went on air I thought it appropriate to review the football fixtures programmes on the County Board website in advance.

Up to late last week a staggering 101 league games were played at senior, intermediate, junior, minor and under-14 levels (the under-16 league has not yet commenced).

That's an impressive array of games and deserves to be acknowledged at a time when Gaelic football in the county is the butt of so much ill-informed comment.

Unfortunately there is a negative side which cannot be ignored. Last year the County Board rightly chastised a number of clubs for giving walk-overs, but that warning appears to have gone unheeded. Since the beginning of this year clubs have conceded 44 walks-overs.

That is unacceptable and the clubs involved must be made accountable. Why do they go to the bother of affiliating (and paying costly insurance) when they end up unable to field teams?

The easy solution is to opt out of all inter-county competitions, but that would be a cop-out by a proud GAA county. County Board officers have tried and tried valiantly to improve the current plight of Kilkenny football. Progress, though, cannot be made by those officers alone.

Apathy from clubs

Notwithstanding the impressive number of club football games played annually in Kilkenny (far more it must be said than the number of hurling games played in many counties), the apathy from clubs and many players is at the core of Kilkenny's footballing plight.

Improving Kilkenny's football fortunes will not happen unless there is a change of attitude from clubs and everyone involved with clubs. When events like those of last week hit the headlines, the spotlight immediately falls on the County Board officers.

Ultimately, though, it is the clubs and their players who will decide where Kilkenny football goes from here. The county officers are not miracle workers, but maybe with a little help from the wider GAA fraternity in the county something like last week's under-21 fiasco can be avoided in the future

MesAmis (Dublin) - Posts: 13796 - 10/03/2012 13:18:30    1126324

08/03/2012 18:07:11
cuchulainn35
County: Armagh
Posts: 463

1125442
right faithful you have missed the point,

as i said only cork and dublin can really compeet in both codes on a continued basis,

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Galway? Also, Offaly managed it for several generations in a row. I don't see why others couldn't aim for it. Antrim have a big enough population, so do we and so do Tipp, Limerick and Down just off the top of my head

There's other factors like the prevalence of other sports but I don't think their insurmountable

Count_Awesome (Kildare) - Posts: 736 - 11/03/2012 19:36:40    1127026

Ultimately, though, it is the clubs and their players who will decide where Kilkenny football goes from here. The county officers are not miracle workers, but maybe with a little help from the wider GAA fraternity in the county something like last week's under-21 fiasco can be avoided in the future,

Correct on this point but this is not the point, Here in Cavan hurling was the responsibility of the "clubs" but the "clubs" had no interest in hurling and elected like minded people onto the county board so progress was always going to be painfully slow on the hurling front. In 2009 people got together and formed brand new regional hurling clubs as the club system as it was failed hurling. Some of these clubs have no facilities of their own and use existing GFC facilities and the new 3G pitch in Breffni Park to fulfil fixtures. This was resisted initially, as it was seen as a change too far, but the county board saw sense and allowed this to happen. It has since been adopted by Cavan County Board and is in the National Hurling Plan as one of the best ways to promote the game in weaker counties. Kilkenny should use this model for football. Although clubs in Kilkenny will tell you they promote football it would be better if like minded people from 5-6 (hurling) clubs got together and formed a regional (not an amalgamation)club with people at the helm who have football at their heart. This will help the game improve no end.

breffni666 (Cavan) - Posts: 294 - 11/03/2012 20:06:49    1127071

In the Liam McCarthy Cup, have KK play the second half in football. This will ensure that football quality improves and that KK will no longer be in a group of one in either code.

omahant (USA) - Posts: 3229 - 11/03/2012 20:50:12    1127112

Apologies keeper7, I got mixed up.

What I will tell you though, in 1983 the Leitrim u16 hurlers won the All Ireland u16 'C' title by beating, would you believe.. Longford. It was hailed 'The greatest day in Leitrim hurling' and it stands to this day.

And Mod, I know I am going off topic, just needed to clear something up with my Longford pal.

ahsure. (Galway) - Posts: 1669 - 11/03/2012 20:59:16    1127129

No doubt Longford 7 that hurling promotion is a priority of the highest order, but football in KK is of massive concern also purely down to one reason isolation.

In hurling you can put groups of counties at the same level into the pot, we have 4 tiers in my eyes should only be three but anyway, in football there is enough room for two tiers but KK arent anywhere near that 2nd tier, which is why we must find a level for them as we have done with the tiered hurling system for longford cavan fermanagh, it would be my hope that one day all counties will have had the same input to development of both hurling and football, and that one day both codes will only have two tiers until that day hurling could have two and unofficially it currently does everyone else and KK.

I stand by what i said i feel they should enter the all ireland junior, with the english counties at senior level and find a club level for their u21s and minors.

I would like to see the lietrim/cavan/fermanagh/longford etc intercounty teams creating a divisional board where they can run a provincial knock out championship for their counties and maybe even enter an amalgamated team into the christy ring cup and eventually hopefully the laim mc carthy, in football terms we need to find a common ground for kilkenny and its not as easy pairing them off as any inter county team in ireland is in excess of 30 points of them, therefore to find there match we need to be inventive, entering the JFC is one of these inventions, maybe ask counties interested would they like to enter a junior league also to further development.

North Side Gael (None) - Posts: 1076 - 12/03/2012 08:40:21    1127233

Funny how this time last year there wasn't a thread on this result.

Leinster M.F.L. 2011

Group 3 RD 3

Laois 0-5 V 3-21 Dublin

Faithfull (Offaly) - Posts: 573 - 12/03/2012 11:34:49    1127374

ashure,

No bother, lad. You must have fairly trawled through the records to find that bit of trivia!

North Sider,

Point taken.

keeper7 (Longford) - Posts: 4088 - 12/03/2012 14:58:19    1127657