Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Club v county battle a game with no winners
THESE past few weeks have felt like an excruciatingly long wait for inter-county matches to resume with only the anticipation of what’s around the corner to nourish the soul.
When you’re starved of the action it makes you realise how lucky we are to have the GAA in our lives. Can we put a price on the entertainment it brings? But that’s not to say that if you put your ear to the ground you won’t hear rumblings of discontent. It won’t make front page headlines but almost all inter-county managers have been having problems with clubs – and vice-versa – over player availability. There’s been a lot of wrangling – with more intensity in some counties than others. Some club managers take it very personally when their county players aren’t allowed to play for their side when the National League is over. You can see their point and I know for a fact it’s caused plenty of trouble in five or six counties, particularly around the Midlands. In some instances there have been letters and phonecalls flying about, real personal stuff and real hostility. It leaves a bad taste because it’s the player who is caught in the middle. But the problem is that if everyone is being honest, a player can’t serve two masters in terms of the demands they both want to place on him. There are no winners in this situation either. The upshot is though that a lot of club managers were missing top players. I know that in the Midlands that meant missing important League games to take that postleague break. In fairness to the players, with club games and inter-county challenge games going on, there appears to be no downtime. And that’s the crux of the problem – their bodies do need a break at some stage. This club v county conflict has played out in Westmeath, in Meath, in Louth and Offaly. I’ve heard the stories – some not particularly nice ones – as people get personal and fall out. I fully understand both sides of the argument, but Johnny Cooper provided a remarkable stat that I’m sure pricked the attention of club managers everywhere when he openly admitted that out of a 12-month calendar, he had played four competitive matches with his club, Na Fianna. That’s astonishing. But are there many in Dublin, or in Na Fianna, who are complaining? No. He’s a hugely successful part of this Dublin team and that’s the way it is. In fact I’m told there were three other Dublin players who played even less club football. At the end of the day, both managers have a job to do so it’s about sitting around a table or having a chat on the phone and working it out. In years gone by Louth players, who would have played five League games for the club before the Leinster Championship, would be flogged and tired by the time they lined out for the county. Now they’ll play two or three and that’s the sensible approach to take. But that kind of thinking hasn’t stuck nationwide yet. The players remain in the middle of this club v county conflict and are being asked to make unfair decisions. There’s no need for it. The GAA must provide a genuine master fixture list that highlights the important club matches that star players must play in for the club. Surely it would help bring an end to the civil war.
The GAA must put together a fixture list to end the war