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From tonight, the 20th of june, the minor football management have resigned this is because the fixtures committee refuse to call off the senior, intermediate and junior championship games this weekend. There are 14 players out of the 30, which are involved in these games and therefore the minor team can’t train because players most train and play with their club up to 6 days before the county match. This is simply unacceptable for a team trying to prepare for a leinster semi-final after 3 weeks of lads doing leaving certs and were unable to train during that time either. Straight after the management resigned the players followed and tonight there is no minor football team or management. The players are asking their clubs to back them and other senior county players have already committed themselves to backing the team . Its terrible it had to go this far but hopefully it can be resolved quickly and the team can get back to preparing for the game instead of fighting with the fixtures committee and county board.

You would have thought that after last weekend they'd have been doing more to try and help out one of the few sides we have left in the championship.

And with the footballers out of the senior, are we really going to be short on weekends to play between now and mid-september??

This is very foolish on behalf of the county board/fixtures committee. A fixtures backlog is not likely, and this is the only championship football team left. Unless there's anything significant not mentioned above, I'd be inclined to agree with the actions of the management and players.

If this is really as detailed above, then it really makes you wonder - will we ever learn? For heaven's sake, what is going on when debacles like this can arise over and over again?

Who let this happen, either knowingly or through ignorance?
Who let it come to this, on all sides?
Who is being stubborn?
Who is asking for too much in this "stand-off", knowing they have room to compromise?

It's like the F1 race in the US at the weekend. The actual outcome belittles ALL the parties to the event. Everyone is to blame when the organisation fails. If it is not fixed and fast, then they should not be allowed to fail again.

My question is much more straightforward - again assuming what Minor detailed above is the facts exactly as they exist. I'm open to the possibility that the county board may have a different view on things.

Who loses out if the games get put back by a week?

Seriously, we have 3 months before our Championships have to be completed, and this is the only county football team we have left in competition. By no stretch of the imagination are we under pressure to get fixtures run off. 3 months would be enough time to run the whole thing from scratch if necessary for crying out loud.

Either the county board can come up with a very good explanation as to why these games are going ahead, or they will look very foolish. And even if they do look foolish, it's better than not cancelling them even at this late stage, because if they actually go ahead in these circumstances then it's both foolish and pig headed.

Lads, I've been slating this County Board, and it's previous incarnation under Brendan Ward for years.

They are an absolute joke. Full stop. There has got to be wholesale cleanout, because I don't think these shower of meglomaniacs in their Carroll Cuisine jackets can understand that they are supposed to be facilitators of the county teams doing well, not obstacles to it.

Plonkers.

sorry posted on wrong one.

minor situation is a disaster... county board and offaly football manager should resign and lets start with a clean slate........... we could never be this lucky???

We actually have what seems to be a strange situation where the "County Board" actually has NO say in fixtures. The fixtures committee has plenary powers, ie can do what they like, and while delegates at meetings can plead and cajole all they like, they have no power to overturn any decision of the fixtures committee.

Having said that, most of us complain regularly about the long gap between championship games - which is one of the reasons they reduced the "free time" before inter county games to 6 days. Delegates at meetings have been quite vocal in insisting that club games SHOULD go ahead the weekend before inter-county games, so as to reduce the long gaps between games, but then when the theory is put into practice and games are fixed, nobody's happy either.

I heard there was a meeting last night - anyone hear whether the matches are to be called off or not?

Aye Treas, but it's the county board who voted to give the Fixtures committee it's plenary powers. Let's face it the County Boards is THE body responsible for running Gaelic Games in our county, and at the moment they are running it into the ground.

(I am aware you are, or were a delegate, and I should stress that I am more talking about the officers of the County Board.)

Treasurer wrote:Having said that, most of us complain regularly about the long gap between championship games - which is one of the reasons they reduced the "free time" before inter county games to 6 days. Delegates at meetings have been quite vocal in insisting that club games SHOULD go ahead the weekend before inter-county games, so as to reduce the long gaps between games, but then when the theory is put into practice and games are fixed, nobody's happy either.

It is utterly farcical that our county championship can take as much as six months from beginning to end - and it suits no-one. However I would have thought it would make more sense just not to start it as early - aim for an early July start, and on the off chance you do get knocked out a lot earlier/later than you thought, then adjust. 6 days between games is fine - if it's club to club. If it's club to county or vice versa where there's a lot more adjustment required then six days is not much at all. Ye're oen David Franks being the best example - he goes from being a corner back, a very specialist position, to being a midfielder, main engine and heavy scorer on the team.

We'd love to say what if you have games going on beyond that, but Offaly hasn't had a team involved at any level in August for some time now (2000??) so realistically until we see signs of improvement to be building around that premise is silly.

Anyway, we wouldn't arrange club fixtures the same week as a senior county match, and I'd say there are very clubs in Offaly with the depth not to have a county minor playing at either senior or intermediate level. I'm amazed it's as low as 14, the number mentioned by Minor above. Anyone can see that this was a foolish call, and utterly unnecessary. If it was hurling fixtures and one or two players like Gerry Treacy or Stephen Egan were caught in the crossfire I'd sympathise with the fixtures committee, but not here.

I get the feeling no-one is going to really agree with me on this one but I think the blame lies with the management team here. They are acting like children just because they didn't get their way.

I mean it is a bit unrealistic telling lads not to play with their clubs as far back as last week when the Offaly match was so far away and as for the whole training before the match I don't see the difference that six days makes considering these lads are together for the past eight months.

Anyway, my main point is that Phil O' Reilly and Co. are taking this far too personally for my liking when, in my opinion, anyone who sees minor intercounty matches as more important than senior club matches is crazy.

My view on this is that it is pure greediness on the part of the clubs.
In my own club, when I was young enough to be considered for minor and Senior or Junior, there was a policy that if a player was eligible for Minor or U-21 and any fixture clashes occurred then that player had to play at the under age level. This seems a good policy to me. We hear a lot of talk about burnout these days, well the clubs have as much responsibility for this as anyone else.

from talking to a member of that minor squad he said that they were told that they werent to play with their clubs at all 5 weeks prior to the westmeath match.Seems a bit much for a minor footbal team?

True Red wrote:from talking to a member of that minor squad he said that they were told that they werent to play with their clubs at all 5 weeks prior to the westmeath match.Seems a bit much for a minor footbal team?

Five weeks is a bit on the ridiculous side. However asking young lads to go out and play senior club championship against hardened ould lads out to do them in a week before is foolish.

I'm not saying management isn't out of order a bit too, or unrealistic, but in this particular stand off I think everyone would be best served by the games just being called off.