Joe hits out at County Board

[Over The Black Spot]

Where does it say that players were trying to get onto the pitch? One player, the injured James Rigney, was out jogging when a jumped up nobody told him to get off the pitch.

The team was 'booked in' for 11:30 to use facilities under the stand. They were told they couldn't walk across the field from the dressing rooms to the stand side... ffs!

POTH, it's quite obvious that you dislike Joe Dooley or some of his management team but, even allowing for that, your comments re cancelling training are so far wrong it's almost unbelievable. For someone who likes to come across as knowing a bit about the game, you must be going around with your head in the clouds not to be able to see what's going on. Anyone who is involved in anyway with their own club, or meets and talks to real hurling people on a regular basis knows what's going on in this county and is appalled by it.

And the county boards tactic of waiting til Cork beat them and then saying ''we told ya so'' won't fool anyone. I believe, like most others here I would guess, that the current management is badly in need of refreshing but that shouldn't fool people into thinking that's the issue. This is about long term neglect of our game and it has to stop now.

[bracknaghboy]

Expect this to spill over into a major issue come next season. I was in Birr a while back and was being told players would stike if games were not moved back to Birr next year. I laughed at the time but now this letter seems set to spark an internal row within the county over the coming months. I'm not saying that there were not issues with the boys getting access to OCP but I reckon this letter has more to do with the staging of games in Birr more than anything else ?
Also Joe is just getting an excuse in before the likely defeat to Cork saturday week.....he always seems to have some problems to maon about when a big game is on the horizon.

thats rich coming from you from the football end, i suppose cribbin is doing a great job, who knows we might beat Cork at least we could hold our heads up after the
Dublin hurling game unlike the footballers the day before who were a disgrace to offaly. if you don't like going to matches in birr stay in Bracknagh Birr was always the
hurling end for games and the hurling people want that back so why would it upset you from bracknagh where they play the game beats me.

Suppose I best respond to this bile from Townman:

1.) I've every right to discuss hurling even if I am from the "football end" as you put it. Just as much as a chap from Birr, Crinkle, Killavila or anywhere from south has a right to discuss football, we are all from Offaly. I've been involved in teams all over the country in both codes and have supported Offaly in both codes for 30 years.
2.) No Cribbin is doing a terrible job, although I never mentioned him in my post.
3.) Yes the hurlers might beat Cork and Yes the footballers were a disgrace.
4.) Never said I don't like going to Birr, I've gone there year in year out. Again nothing in my post suggests the notion of playing in Birr "upsets" me, I just pointed out that in my opinion i'd say that the issue of games in Birr was the main motivation for the letter to the county board.

[faithfullad]

Jaysus townman, you're like a spoilt child when you get angry on these forums...

[townblue]

dooley blowing smoke out to cover the hideing we will get off cork ................ duigan and regan should stick to talking crap about other counties ....all blown up so can get back to birr thats all.... jesus are we suddenly a contender if we hurl in birr again my arse ! ... more than a pitch our problem , be more in dooleys line to give out about structure s we dont have in place to get us to top again his glory is just beaten antrim and gettin us relegated

[southoffaly]

the one talking out through their arse is you trueblue ,these guys won allrelands for club and county and as the statistics show in the independant today only one outside of the what we call the real hurling area has one of those kevin martin .hurling people form the hurling area in offaly from supporters to players and former players want the hurling back in our homeland and all the traditional hurling clubs , what part of that do ye thick football people not get .( sure ye had to come to birr to make up yer county football team , which tells you all were they are ).
county semi finals played in tullamore for the last few years should have been played in banagher or rath for example .you can say what you like about the two boys but the were 100% spot on .this argument you use about the pitch in birr goes to show how much you understand or know about hurling in offaly . the stronghold of hurling is in south offaly and if that isnt strong then there is no standard of hurling .
too many clowns worrying about paying for that ground in tullamore are the same people that ignored the structures of hurling .tullamore can have the county championship matches ,but some of the league and underage and club matches should be played in the hearthland of the hurling not in what we regard as a neutral venue .
READ THE INDO , AND THE TWO LADS WHAT THE STATISICS AND THEY SAID IS WHAT ALL HURLING PEOPLE IN OFFALY ARE IN AGREEMENT WITH . non hurling people are the only ones who seem to have a problem with this .THE REAL REASON THIS COMING TO A HEAD ALSO BECAUSE OF NEGLECT HURLING IS ON THE VERGE OF TOTAL COLAPSE AND THESE GUYS ALSO ARE LOOKING AT IT FROM THAT ANGLE OF KEEPING IT GOING AND HOPEFULLY GET THE STANDARDS BACK UP DOWN THE ROAD .

[Superted]

Cut the shit townman! the treatment of the hurlers is a disgrace and to hurling in general is a disgrace within Offaly.

[Plain of the Herbs]

To give you the courtesy of a reply, Spot;

I wasn’t in O’Connor Park on Saturday so I am going on the information that is available, the manager’s statement and the County Board ‘source’. Both are scant on specifics but as I said before, neither contradicts the other. From the timeline laid out it appears to me that the team were not prevented from training on the pitch at 1 pm. Perhaps you would care to enlighten us if you are aware that this incorrect?

Am I wrong in remarking that the cancellation was ordered on a whim? If so, was it planned in advance by the manager? Also, why write a strongly worded letter and leave it at that? Why didn’t the manager take the nuclear option and resign? Or at least threaten to? That would have shown them in the County Board, wouldn’t it? Or is this really about ‘long term neglect of our game’, as you put it.

I’m well aware of the deficiencies in the coaching of skill-sets to the Offaly hurlers at all age groups and I have posted my views on this site regularly over the last seven years. I have been consistent in those views, that there is nowhere near enough emphasis on catching, on controlling the play, on using possession and on support play, and that the romantic obsession with ground hurling is dragging Offaly further down hurling’s ranks.

I’m also well aware that the preparation of the County team is well below what is required to progress at inter-county level, of players doing endless boring ground hurling drills which do nothing to prepare a county team. I’m also aware of the players’ dissatisfaction with the manager and that a good coach brought in this year is being effectively sidelined. Actually half the country knows it.

An Moltóir's statistics in his blog spoke volumes. In the recent Offaly v Dublin LHC match, Dublin made 23 directed long passes; Offaly made 3! The Senior hurlers’ technique in the tackle is not being addressed sufficiently either. They’ve a player sent off in every second game now and facing into the last ten minutes of tight matches with fourteen men is killing them.

Now ‘what’s going on in this county’, as you put it, has been going on for quite some years now. It didn’t start last Saturday, or this year either. Why has it taken until now to write a strongly-worded letter? On the face of it Saturday’s incident, taken in isolation, is miniscule.

That’s why I think something else has taken place, and I suspect it pertains to the manager’s terms and conditions. I also happen to know a bit about Finance, and I know that when the belt needs tightening then expenditure needs to take a haircut. Some items you can do nothing about, but one thing the payee can do something about is the issue of team management expenses. That also happens to be one of the biggest of the Board’s outlays, if not the biggest.

It's the elephant in the room, really.

Where does it say that players were trying to get onto the pitch? One player, the injured James Rigney, was out jogging when a jumped up nobody told him to get off the pitch.

The team was 'booked in' for 11:30 to use facilities under the stand. They were told they couldn't walk across the field from the dressing rooms to the stand side... ffs!

POTH, it's quite obvious that you dislike Joe Dooley or some of his management team but, even allowing for that, your comments re cancelling training are so far wrong it's almost unbelievable. For someone who likes to come across as knowing a bit about the game, you must be going around with your head in the clouds not to be able to see what's going on. Anyone who is involved in anyway with their own club, or meets and talks to real hurling people on a regular basis knows what's going on in this county and is appalled by it.

And the county boards tactic of waiting til Cork beat them and then saying ''we told ya so'' won't fool anyone. I believe, like most others here I would guess, that the current management is badly in need of refreshing but that shouldn't fool people into thinking that's the issue. This is about long term neglect of our game and it has to stop now.

[blue74]

POTH speaks some sense re the sources...cant say i know his sources but from what i hear too dooley threw a major child and spoilt brat wobbly on saturday... and it has boiled over to that effect...

[tmorelad]

A big reason this county can't win anything is this attitude that we come from the "hurling area" of offaly surely the best way foward is to promote both game all over the county all this talk about spirtual home of hurling is a load of bollix if u ask me and alot this arggument is people like Daithi regan trying to drum up a few quid for his club

[offalyman08]

Given that Shane Dooley was born and raised in Ballinagar how about Offaly try play without a "north Offaly" man and lets see how they get on???? The 1-13 he scored against Dublin kept Offaly in the game. Time people accepted us as a county and not as a North/South county

[Long John]

I am not too well informed on this topic so maybe somebody can please just outline the main points to me.

• The gates were locked?? Why, if the team had a session booked?
  
  It was threatened cars would be removed? Why, were they not parked up in the GAA centre car park?
  
  They eventually did gain access to enter O' Connor park? How was that eventually sorted?
  
  Rigney was ordered off the pitch and the players told they could not enter the playing field? Why, what was the reasoning behind this if they had a session booked?

I am just trying to gain an undestanding of the reasoning behind all this. Would be grateful if somebody can clear up those few questions before I cast an opinion on it.

[Plain of the Herbs]

LJ,

For a synopsis I would suggest reading the following:-

The manager's statement which I copied from the Tullamore Tribune site and posted on the middle of page 2 of this thread, and;
The Board's slant which I copied from yesterday's Irish Independent and posted on the bottom of page 2 and the top of page 3 of this thread.

I've merely posted extracts from these articles but I have linked the full article for ease of reference.

There's alot of Purple Monkey Dishwater flying around in all of this. I can't see how this is a Birr v Tullamore issue - if there was a skills competition on any pitch the players surely wouldn't be allowed ramble around on the pitch. Nor is is about protecting the playing surface - there wouldn't have been a skills competition in OCP if it was. And certainly the footballers shouldn't be dragged into this.

It would clarify matters greatly if the manager expanded on many of the points in his letter. Since then all we've had is the Brewery Tap PR machine in full voice citing the issues I noted in my previous paragraph. It seems the manager i's not going to comment any further for the foreseeable future either.

I am not too well informed on this topic so maybe somebody can please just outline the main points to me.

• The gates were locked?? Why, if the team had a session booked?
  
  It was threatened cars would be removed? Why, were they not parked up in the GAA centre car park?
  
  They eventually did gain access to enter O' Connor park? How was that eventually sorted?
  
  Rigney was ordered off the pitch and the players told they could not enter the playing field? Why, what was the reasoning behind this if they had a session booked?

I am just trying to gain an undestanding of the reasoning behind all this. Would be grateful if somebody can clear up those few questions before I cast an opinion on it.

[durra1]

Bang on the money there offalyman08

But for the hard work of some in North Offaly /Tullamore in persisting with hurling development in the face of adversity, there’s every chance Shane Dooley could have been lining out with The footballers or an AIL rugby team.

A few of ye are seriously blinkered on the North / South thing and are using this issue to push another agenda.

The issue is not North -v- South, the issue is the preparation of the playing panel to the highest possible standards.

The demographic breakdown of the county has changed hugely since the 80s and 90s. Back then, small agrarian holdings were sustainable and no non-nationals competed with locals for jobs.

The building boom has concentrated development in the big towns and that is where development in the future will be concentrated for many reasons (proximity to good employment prospects, proximity to commuter hubs, access to water/ mains supply in the county side, fuel prices, broadband etc etc.).

That means Tullamore, areas of east Offaly and arguably Birr.Things are what they are and the day of the 20 acre farmer is over.

For lads to come on this board (and the likes of Regan/Duigan to be mouthing off on the national airways) saying hurling should return to its 8 mile radius of Birr is misty-eyed, Alice in Wonderland stuff – harking back to an “in my day” era when everything was different.

Townman and townblue – sorry to use you as an examples - but your posts on this issue are of the shoot-from-the-hip / brainfart variety and to me anyway, smack of those who are really out of touch with the wider issues.

The work of the Hurling Development Committee of the GAA as well as concentrating on weaker counties is about development in populated / urban areas of counties where hurling is already played.

For those of you who can stomach it – swalli it – because this is the future.

For the record, I am in favour of all league and county club games to semi-finals returning to Birr – County Finals and Senior Championship games should be played in OCP, that being THE COUNTY GROUND. I’d be open to a persuasive argument on underage championship games in Birr.

[townman]

dooley blowing smoke out to cover the hideing we will get off cork ................ duigan and regan should stick to talking crap about other counties ....all blown up so can get back to birr thats all.... jesus are we suddenly a contender if we hurl in birr again my arse ! ... more than a pitch our problem , be more in dooleys line to give out about structure s we dont have in place to get us to top again his glory is just beaten antrim and gettin us relegated

a sure the knows like yourself said we would get a hideing off Dublin as well

[townman]

Cut the shit townman! the treatment of the hurlers is a disgrace and to hurling in general is a disgrace within Offaly.

where did i say it wasn't a disgrace to offaly hurling you should read my post again mush