Minor Football 2026

[jimbob17]

Interesting points on what other counties are able to facilitate.

Firstly, on the parents front. The point was not that always, every little Johnny has to play. The point was that if parents are going to be driving their kids around, that all is done fairly and above board - and that nepotism is ruled out and avoided by virtue of keeping parents away from being involved with their own kids as coaches at county level. I'm not saying this as a pointing at anybody specifically. This may not be an issue and I stand to be corrected by anyone with deeper knowledge of personnel involved than I, but for optics sake and nepotism prevention sake, this should be best practice. It would be extremely difficult for any parent who is coaching a county team to remain unbiased positively or negatively when in such a scenario.


Re the line explaining about optimising nos, and dual issue reported by LS. I simply don't buy that. With small bit of digging, I'm told our club has a couple of players in with Dev squads as dual players - who ARE facilitated to PLAY BOTH by ARC. They are even told which sessions to attend every week so DUAL GAA IS being facilitated when players are very strong in both codes - where generally there is an every 2nd week rotation. This contradicts what was reported earlier.

What is not facilitated I'm led to believe is that if they are playing other sports, and again, I stand to be corrected. Now I can understand that Offaly wants and needs to pitch itself above Ragball Rovers club soccer team for example, but what about the elite kid who is in FAI development pathway, or Kennedy Cup or in Leinster rugby dev pathway through Midlands or whatever - who enjoy being good at various codes? These would be among the high end talent that we appear to be cutting off. I'm talking about the young Cormac Egans, Dylan Hylands, Kyle Higgins', Keith O'Neills, Lee Pearsons and Paddy Dunicans among others who can thrive in any sport and were in elite dev systems of other sports through teens. Remember, these kids are still betwen ages of 13 and 16 through this period. This is the tap that we appear to be turning off since this 'ARC' took over, forcing this type of talent to choose at too young an age, often meaning Offaly misses out. If this occurs long term, we are cutting our own throats, development wise. In such an instance, some of this talent may return at minor level, but without the knowledge, tactical and physical development that they would have got if kept engaged through teenage years. Basically, these elite 13 and 14 Yr olds will not develop like they could.

My belief is that we need to find a way of not cutting off the very best tap of talent. Can we afford to do that? I don't believe we can if it means 5 or 6 of our best players at a given age group cannot play because our own 'policies' preclude them. BTW, I wouldn't be making allowances for club soccer players over Offaly, but I would for those in higher end dev squads in other sports if they would be among our best players at a given age grade also. They are our talent as much as they are other sports talents, that we should be fighting for, and not allowing other sports to have carte blanch access to. To do otherwise is naive at best.

Interested to note that Laois can facilitate that elite athlete. That is what I'm talking about. I am aware of similar instances in other counties in relation to athletics, basketball, rugby and soccer. Like I said previously, If likes of Dublin, Cork and Limerick - big powers with lots of talent and money can find a balanced approach to not losing talent, then maybe little Offaly should consider same. Again, this element of external control did not exist when likes of our good U20 hurling and football squads were coming through the dev squads. Maybe that is why we did so well with those teams, winning underage All Irelands, as those overseeing it did not cast off the best talent. I am told that those overseeing this ARC now are relatively new to the table and have only taken this stance in last 3 or 4 years led by Academy Underage Directors.

Beyond that, and i stand to be corrected on this, what would those think about scenarios, where said ARC committee over rules management requests to trial good players they've seen in club games, who are not playing other sports and are available and willing to come in to a trial, but on the say so of ARC committee, are blocked from being asked for whatever reason. And on other side of coin, what about ARC blocking the release of chaps (again for unexplained reasons - let it be political reasons, club loyalty reasons or otherwise) who have shown themselves to be struggling at the dev squad level. As I said, I stand to be corrected but I am led to believe from more than one source, that there is more than one alleged scenario where such examples have occurred. This level of alleged external control is neither healthy, nor fair to players, coaches or wider Offaly GAA support base. Such actions could only leave managements feeling frustrated and disrespected when such decisions are called over their heads by people who don't really know the players or the level they are at in relation to others.

The main point here is that ANY manager that is willing to volunteer their time and expertise to manage a county team, should have the autonomy to add to his squad or release from said squad within reasonable parameters of ARC to a level of reason, but should NEVER be over-ruled or blocked from making such decisions in best interest of Offaly without a clear and valid disclosed explanation

[Anon444]

Based on what is said here, it appears that management teams do not have autonomy over who they can call in and who they can drop if not at the required level. I wonder does this go on in any other county? I highly, highly doubt it. Also, I don’t know this ARC group personally but I’ve heard it’s only 3/4 who make all the decisions regarding the squads and that coaches have very little say in the grand scheme of things and are there purely to coach. Surely that’s not right? These coaches know their age a lot better than this ARC, they should be trusted when in the role.

[Lone Shark]

Sorry lads , I can't cut and and paste or whatever, but there is a young lad this year from Laois - played with their minor footballers predominatly at half back - played with their hurlers on the half forward line - he is currently ranked as No 2 in the European rankings @ the 400mtr hurdles - was 2nd in the All Ireland Schools at that event(out of his age) - broke the record last year that was set in 1982'ish by the guy who won the Gold in the Commenealth Games subsequently . Laois Gaa accomodate him.... just saying -

Just to be clear here, and I hate that I've been inadvertently pegged into the corner of defending one side when that isn't my intention, but the way it was explained to me, this absolutely would NOT be a problem at minor level. The brief for minor, where it is a competition geared towards producing Leinster and All-Ireland champions, is that the manager is entitled to select whoever he wants, regardless of other commitments.

What we're talking about here is development squads, where my understanding is that the policy is to give preference to a child who will be able to attend all sessions and games, and thus get the maximum benefit, as opposed to trying to accommodate a child that might have more natural ability at the relevant GAA sport, but who may not be in attendance as consistently because of their other commitments.

Additionally, there is a policy of ensuring that the club games programme continues and that all development squad players are available to their clubs all the time, and the view taken there is that if a child is not making themselves consistently available to their clubs, or if putting a child on both a hurling and football development squad would leave them overloaded when club commitments are factored into the mix, they again prioritise the integrity of the club programme.

And while the first of these two policies is one where there are pros and cons on both sides, and I happily accept it's up for debate, I would firmly stand behind the second part of that all day long. The most important responsibility of Offaly GAA is to provide a robust games programme for all members, children and adults. The success of Offaly's intercounty teams is, and should always be, secondary to that.


Now with all that said, if there are instances where at minor (or U-20 level), either managers or Offaly GAA are putting in place selection policies that mean that good players are not given reasonable accommodation to play for the county and to pursue other sporting ambitions as well, then yes, I'll agree that we've gone to far. But the examples I've seen, such as the likes of the Kearney brothers, tells me that this isn't the case.

[Lone Shark]

And on Jimbob's post above, just to follow on from a few additional points:

(1) The issue of nepotism is completely separate to everything else that's being discussed here, and while I see why there are people making the connection, but it shouldn't be connected. Yes, absolutely, it should be avoided where possible - and while that's particularly difficult at club underage level where quite often you need every helpful body that makes themselves available, it shouldn't be a problem at county level.

(2) Once again - minor and up is very different to development squads. Don't need to expand on that again.

(3) I'm only speaking about what I'm told are the policies, that's not me saying that there aren't dual players on both development squads. I'm only speaking in generalities, but I do see why it would put pressure on a child to play with two development squads and two club teams, and particularly when you know yourself, a child like that would often be asked to play up the age grades as well, Maybe not in Tullamore or Edenderry, but if you have a very good U-14 in Kinnitty or in Ballycumber, he's going to be playing U-16 as well. That's getting very close to overloading a child, and to my mind, if something has to give, it shouldn't be the club.

(4) I appreciate the point that we don't want to cut ties with a child who might be on a serious soccer or rugby academy programme, but we have to be cognisant of what that child is able to give to an Offaly development squad. There's no point giving a slot to a child who will do well to be present for 50% of the activity. You're putting finite resources into a child who won't get the most benefit, and who might well end up unavailable to Offaly in the long run anyway. Life lives in the grey area so I appreciate it's tough to draw a hard line one way or another, but there are kids who wanted to be on development squads when they weren't available on any Saturday for two months on end, and there are kids who might be playing high level soccer or rugby, but who can still make every session. Those are very different scenarios.

(5) We are the GAA. Of course we should not treat commitments to other sports similarly to commitments to the other GAA sport. I live in a county that wanted to change our underage club football programme to accommodate local soccer, even though doing so meant more clashes with the club hurling programme. And because only about 30% of this county has players playing hurling and 70% has lads playing soccer, that was the way the majority voted. I'm not exaggerating when I say I LOST IT at the Coiste na nÓg meeting where this was discussed.

(6) Finally, to the real thorny point - that of the autonomy of the managers when it comes to selecting players.

Again, I can only say what I'm told - which is that the ARC oversight is there to enforce that all players selected are available to their clubs, and that there are no disciplinary or attendance issues. If that's not what's happening, that's another matter.

I don't disagree in the slightest with this sentiment below, the issue is where the truth regarding implementation actually falls. Figuring that out is a longer day's work.

The main point here is that ANY manager that is willing to volunteer their time and expertise to manage a county team, should have the autonomy to add to his squad or release from said squad within reasonable parameters of ARC to a level of reason, but should NEVER be over-ruled or blocked from making such decisions in best interest of Offaly without a clear and valid disclosed explanation