New year, new appointments

The last few weeks have been very busy behind the scenes for the club with a number of key appointments been announced since the new year.

Congrats to Maria Childs, who was appointment as our first ever female secretary for the club. This a great move for the club and we wish Maria all the best in her new role. Thank you very much to outgoing secretary Dan McCarthy for all of his hard work over the last few years as role of secretary.

Our new junior and senior management team has also been confirmed as follows: Manager: Dan McCarthy, Selectors: Fergal Fitzgibbon, Derek Gallahue, Ken O’Keeffe, Trainer: Brian Begley. We wish the new management team all of the best as we go into our 3rd season of senior football. Thank you to the outgoing management team of John McGrath, Sean Kearney and Margaret Ann McGrath for all of their work over the last few seasons.

Finally, thank you to Liam Allen for all of his work as Club na nÓg PRO over the last few years. Liam has often offered a helping hand with the adult club for any PRO duties. Thank you for all of your efforts Liam.

INTER-COUNTY UPDATE

Congratulations to Conor McGrath and Zach McCarthy on making the Limerick U20 football panel. Also, well done to Bob Childs who lined out with Limerick at the weekend and secured a great win over Longford in the first round of the league.

IRELAND LIGHTS UP CAMPAIGN

The first initiative in our healthy club will be participating in the Ireland Lights up campaign. Over the last twelve months we have made huge advances by completing our latest development plan, a 500 metre community walkway. Our new walkway, which has a tarmacadam surface, is a safe space to exercise for all members in the community including young people, parents with buggies, elderly and people with disabilities. Ireland Lights Up (ILU) encourages GAA clubs across the 32 counties to turn on their floodlights and open their walking tracks to enable their local communities to come together to walk and talk in a safe environment during the long dark evenings of winter.

This is also being run in conjunction with RTE’s Operation Transformation, (which returned to our screens on January 5th) who will shine a light on this great initiative by showcasing each week on the show GAA clubs that are participating in ILU. Our social walking was in full swing before Christmas and returned Wednesday, 5th January and every Wednesday from 7pm to 8pm, with the launch of our participation in the Ireland lights up campaign. This is for all ages who wish to clock up there steps in a relaxed and fun environment. The Ireland Lights up campaign will run from Wednesday, 12th January to Wednesday, 2nd March 2022.

THE MYLIFE EVERY STEP COUNTS CHALLENGE

As an added incentive Irish Life in partnership with the GAA are running the My Life Every Step Counts Challenge. The challenge is for the club to walk 4,000 kilometres which is approximately the distance around Ireland. The challenge commenced on 12th January and will run for five weeks until midnight on 16th February. The challenge will be across the four provinces with each club who reaches the target of 4,000 kilometres included in a prize draw. In each province there are 3 O’Neills vouchers up for grabs - €2,500, €1,500 and €1,000. Any club that tracks more than 4,000km during Every Step Counts will be entered into the prize draw in their province. This is open to anybody who is out walking anywhere and does not have to be done at the pitch or at specific time. To join in the challenge download the My life App, register your details and select the Munster challenge and then select Galtee Gaels GAA Club. Full information is on the https://mylife. irishlife.ie/every-step-counts-2022.

BALLYGIBLIN IN CROKER!

Best of luck to our neighbours Ballygiblin in their Junior All-Ireland final this weekend against Kilkenny champions, Mooncoin. It is great to see a local club play in an All-Ireland final in Croke Park and we wish them all the best from all at Galtee Gaels.