Football on its knees in the city

FRANK FARRAGHER

A STRONG warning was issued at this week’s final Football Board AGM that the game faced a major challenge to compete with other codes in Galway city and needed a new impetus over the coming months and years.

Alfie Howley, of the St. James’s GAA club, told delegates in Loughgeorge on Monday night, that rugby clubs like Galwegians and Corinthians had well over 100 under-10s and under-12s out for weekend coaching sessions.

“Decisions were made as regards under-age football, especially in relation to the younger ages. The one thing I would like to see happening is the restoration of the under-12 grade.

“If we don’t get in there with the under-8s, the under-10s and under-12s, then we certainly are going to lose the battle at under-age level with the other codes,” said Howley.

His views were supported by St. Michael’s delegate, Tommy Kelly, who pleaded with the football authorities to ‘protect the game in the city.

“We need to keep football in the city on top of the agenda – it needs to be a vibrant game that the kids want to play here in the city,” said Kelly.

However a number of other speakers including Football Board Chairman, John Joe Holleran and Connacht Council President, Frank Burke, said that an awful lot of very good work was being done through the coaching schemes, across both the city and county.Burke asked all clubs to appoint a liaison officer to keep in regular

touch with all the national schools in the area. “Such people provide absolutely vital links between the club and the school – this is a very important position for all clubs to fill,” said Burke.

In the course of a lengthy chairman’s address, Holleran implored all clubs and their representatives to ‘talk up the game’ especially in the city, where Galway had one of the finest stadiums in the country.He said that one of the aims of the Football Board was to get more people, and especially more people from the city, to come to Pearse Stadium for the major club and county matches.

The outgoing chairman, now at the end of his five year term, paid tribute to the two Galway players who had recently announced their retirement from inter-county football – Padraic Joyce and Joe Bergin. He said that Joe Bergin, after winning a senior All-Ireland with Galway in 2001, had then gone on to captain the county under-21 side to All-Ireland success a year later.

“As for Padraic Joyce, everyone with an interest in football – both in Galway and across the country – has the greatest of respect for him. I doubt if we have seen anyone better,” said Holleran.

He also urged the football fraternity in the county to ‘buy into’ the new initiative as regards the administration of GAA in the county, with Loughgeorge now the centre of excellence for Gaelic games in Galway.

For more, read this week's Connacht Tribune.