Ladies push ahead
Club action to start in coming weeks
WEXFORD LADIES’ football are pushing ahead with their plans to get the club championship under way in the coming weeks, following the guidelines laid down by the G.A.A. hierarchy on return to competition.
The county executive met at the weekend to get the plan in order after the potential re-start for club competitions was moved forward two weeks to July 17, and it was decided that each team will get at least three championship games.
The adults get under way that first weekend and the format has been altered slightly. Round-robin groups remain, with four teams in each group at Senior level.
All teams will advance to the knockouts, with the extra two weeks allowing for quarter-finals to be played.
There will be no relegation from any of the adult grades but promotion will remain.
And things will be balanced out in 2021, when two teams will be relegated from each grade with one coming up.
Finals weekend for the adult championship are scheduled to be played on September 12-13, with the provincial championship going ahead and starting the following weekend.
The adult club leagues in Wexford have been scrapped.
The under-age championships, from Minor down to Under-12, will start soon also. The aim is to get the Minor completed quickly as, with the obvious overlap with adult teams, the idea is to minimise the stress and fixture congestion for those players.
On the inter-county ladies’ football scene, all provincial action has been abandoned for the season.
That means that the Minor and Under-16 teams, who had both completed one match in their respective Leinster championships, are finished for the year, with club action taking precedence.
The adult team will not have a provincial championship to partake in. They will, however, be in All-Ireland championship action after the club championship has been completed, and training can resume for the county team on September 14.
Wexford will be in the Intermediate All-Ireland championship with twelve others.
They will be placed in a group of three or four, will be guaranteed two games, and will have to finish top of the table to progress to the semi-finals.
Those games will begin in October, and the championship will be run off in seven weeks.
The National League, in which Wexford were rooted to the bottom of the table and almost certainly heading for relegation, has been scrapped and declared null and void, meaning Paul Carty’s side will continue in Division 2 next season.