Hurling opener on live TV
TG4 to cover clash of Martin’s and Oulart-The Ballagh
THE CROWD at the venue may be severely restricted, but the eyes of the country will be on Chadwicks Wexford Park on Friday, July 17, when the Pettitt’s Senior hurling championship begins with live television coverage on TG4 of a mouth-watering Group A meeting.
Titleholders St. Martin’s will lock horns with Oulart-The Ballagh in an intriguing tie, with the teams being prepared for battle at present by two former Wexford managers in John Meyler and Liam Dunne respectively.
Hurling followers in the county were taken by pleasant surprise when TG4 announced live coverage of the match before the actual fixture was officially released by the local CCC.
And with attendances at outdoor events set to be still restricted to 200 on Friday week, it’s a considerable coup for the County Board to have the cameras in place, ensuring that fans crying out for some action will be able to watch it from the comfort of their own homes.
The match is one of two set to take place on July 17, along with the Group C meeting of 2019 runners-up St. Anne’s and Rathnure in Bellefield.
A further eight games will be played across the top five grades on the Saturday, with seven more on the Sunday to ensure a lively start to the club hurling championship scene.
The provision of quarter-finals had already been warmly welcomed, and there was a further boost for clubs when the master fixtures plan revealed that the original suggestion of playing midweek matches is now scrapped.
Instead, the group stages of the top four grades will be played over three successive weekends from Friday, July 17, to Sunday, August 2.
An extra week will be needed to determine the knockout qualifiers from the fifth division – the Permanent TSB Junior ‘A’ championship – because it is not possible to stage three first round matches on the opening weekend since some clubs have to wait for their first teams to play.
Quarter-finals in Senior, Intermediate, Intermediate ‘A’ and Junior are pencilled in for the weekend of August 8/9 and, if everything goes according to plan, the deciders in those grades will be played a fortnight later.
Clubs have been advised that the master fixtures plan – which outlines dates in all six adult divisions right up to the Enniscorthy Farm Systems Junior ‘B’ football final on November 14/15 – is subject to change.
In particular, the schedule for the weekend of August 16 and thereafter can only be fully confirmed after the next announcement by the Government in relation to phase four of the national roadmap which is expected to be made before July 20.
As per an earlier announcement, the fixtures for the first weekend are concentrated on four venues: Chadwicks Wexford Park (three), Bellefield (three), O’Kennedy Park, New Ross (three), and St. Patrick’s Park (three).
The venues for the remaining five matches – four Junior and one Junior ‘A’ – will be confirmed over the coming days.
The County Board has noted that the feasibility of home venues for fixtures in these competitions is subject to guidelines from both the Government and the GAA, and clubs will be informed as soon as possible.
The pairings for a full programme of 20 group games on July 25/26, and a similar number on August 1/2, have also been released, with details of venues, days and times to follow in due course.
With two teams to qualify from each group of three, rather than one, it enabled the CCC to finalise who was playing who in rounds two and three in advance, as there can be no dead rubbers now in the last game regardless of previous results.
The fixtures for the first round of the football championships will be issued by August 10, and at present the first games in the top three divisions are due to be played on the 22nd and 23rd, the same weekend as the Pettitt’s SHC, Courtyard Ferns IHC and IAHC finals.
However, it has been stressed that the group stages in football may be brought forward, to accommodate an increased number of spectactors for the semi-final stages of both championships, to the weekend of August 16. That decision will be subject to advice from the Government on outdoor crowd numbers.
Meanwhile, in a deviation from the usual rule, an 18-year-old player (first year out of the Under-17 grade) will have free grading in the adult championships in group games only, prior to the quarter-finals.
A player availing of this rule who lines out for a club’s first team may not play, at any stage, with their third team for the remainder of the championship year.
The change means that a first year adult player can line out for two club teams in the same weekend, as the seven-day rule does not apply for 2020.
The lowest of the six grades, Junior ‘B’, hasn’t been neglected on the fixtures plan, with the all-county quarter-finals in hurling to be played on October 10/11, followed by the football one week later.
This will be the third year of the new system whereby the four beaten District finalists as well as the champions will qualify for the last eight.
If midweek games are to take place in Junior ‘B’ competitions, they should be scheduled for Wednesday or Friday evenings, subject to avoiding clashes with adult teams from the same clubs’ fixtures.
Districts are required to complete their finals on or before Sunday, October 4, and they have also been instructed to provide a full schedule of Junior ‘B’ hurling championship fixtures prior to next Friday, July 10.
Now that clubs have a clear fixtures roadmap to work with, the next task will be for the County Board to outline protocols around fixtures and attendances.
Co. Secretary Gearóid Devitt has stressed that full competition regulations will be issued in advance of those first games on Friday week, July 17.
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