Regionalising groups for Junior Leagues and Championships

[Lone Shark]

Last weekend, in a scribbling capacity, I was covering the Roscommon Junior B final. I've no idea how in the name of the Lord a Junior B final gets delayed until late November, but that's another story. However I was struck by the fact that in researching the build up to it, I noted that a county no bigger than ourselves had regionalised their lower division leagues and their junior championships.

It set me to thinking that there might be merit in doing the same in Offaly for Junior levels and below. Perhaps Junior A championship could be left as is, but rather than playing division 3 and 4 of the league, we could just split them into North and South. This would minimise travelling expenses, make it easier to play games midweek, and to reduce the chances of conceding walkovers. Similarly in Junior B championships, where there are enough teams of course (I know hurling has taken a bit of a hit in numbers recently) it might make more sense to put teams in regional groups rather than have Kinnitty and Raheen in one group, while Shannonbridge and Ballyfore are in another. Plus everybody likes local derbies, even us humble junior B players!

It is heavily dependent on numbers, but any thoughts?