Minor ‘B’ draw discussed

THE now infamous Minor ‘B’ football championship draw conducted by Wicklow GAA’s referee coordinator Eddie Leonard and recorded and published by Games Manager Hugh Kenny was reflected on briefly on two occasions at Monday night’s County Convention in Aughrim.

Hugh Kenny in his detailed report to delegates described how he had taken measures to ensure such a thing would never happen again.

‘The U17 football ‘B’ championship video draw that took place on Wednesday 28th August drew significant and justifiable criticism on social media,’ he wrote. ‘But in no way was the draw corrupt, illegal or dishonest to either Eddie Leonard, myself or the nine clubs involved.

‘It is clear to say that the first draw was only a deciding factor to see which of the seeded clubs went into group A or B, and this had no effect on the integrity of the remainder of the draw.

‘In fact, none of the nine clubs involved had issues or contacted myself or the County Board with this as they knew the rules and the agreed format of the competition.

‘For anybody who didn’t understand this format it was the cause of the widespread comments that spread throughout social media.

‘I have taken measures to ensure that I will never be in a position to allow this to happen again. An independent review committee, set up by Leinster Council GAA, also found that there was no evidence to suggest that we influenced the outcome of the draw,’ he wrote.

The matter was revisited later on in the meeting when Hollywood brought forward a motion that stated that all hurling and football competition draws organised by the county committee or subcommittee be made in the presence of quorum of the organising committee.

The motion stated:

All hurling and football competition draws organized by the county committee or subcommittee shall be made in the presence of Quorum of the organising committee. The competition draw shall be supervised by the senior member of committee present in accordance with practices and systems detailed in T.O. and county byelaws and Code of practice where applicable. Failure to comply with the byelaw shall cause the competition draw to declared void and shall be made in accordance with the byelaw.

Cillin Chaomhin

Speaking on the motion, Hollywood’s Liam Cullen said that he was pleased that Hugh Kenny had included the matter in his report.

‘However, as a club we are moving the motion to put into byelaw that ‘we will expect our county committee when making any draw to adhere to the byelaw and, basically, shut once and for and all and cut any further misadventures we might have, and I think the motion is self-explanatory,’ said Cullen.

‘We’re talking about the Minor ‘B’ football draw,’ said County Chairman Martin Fitzgerald. ‘I’ll just let you know that the report is back on that and there are loads of recommendations on that, and that came from Leinster. Would you be happy to go on Leinster’s recommendations?’

‘Will that Leinster recommendation be a byelaw?’ asked Liam Cullen.

‘Well, we can put it into the byelaws,’ replied Fitzgerald.

‘The only people who can put it into byelaw is the Convention tonight,’ said Liam Cullen.

‘What has Leinster Council added to it that we haven’t got?’ he continued.

‘We’ll be sending it out to the clubs, and we’ll be discussing it at a County Board meeting,’ said Fitzgerald, before stating that a vote would be taken on it.

The motion was put to a vote and it was overwhelmingly carried.