Galway Utd back on track

Keith Kelly

IT has been a hectic few days for Galway United manager Sean Connor as he tries to put together a squad for the 2011 Premier Division season – which kicks-off in 10 days’ time – following last Friday’s successful appeal by the club against the decision not to award it a licence to compete in this year’s Airtricity League.

The club was rocked last Monday to learn it had been refused a licence to compete in either the Premier or First Division on financial grounds, and instead was only awarded a licence to compete in the A Championship.

That would undoubtedly have resulted in the demise of the club, which immediately signalled its intention to appeal the decision, arguing that the main grounds for the refusal – the failure to produce a tax clearance cert from Revenue – was out of its hands as the person who was to sign the cert was on holidays.

An appeal was lodged on Wednesday, and the hearing was held in the FAI’s headquarters in Abbotstown at 8am last Friday, and while many felt the appeal would fall on deaf ears, the club was quietly confident of at least being awarded a First Division licence.

United were allowed make a 10 minute presentation to outline the grounds for its appeal, and that confidence proved well founded when the FAI issued a statement at 10.51am on Friday confirming the success of the appeal.

“The Appeals Body acknowledge that the tax affairs of the club were and are in order and it was clear that the club had made attempts to secure the appropriate documentation but due to exceptional events, were unable to provide it on the date required.

“Given the full circumstances that pertain to this case, the Appeals Body overturned the decision of the Club Licensing Committee and awarded a League Licence – Premier Division to Galway United FC,” the statement read.

United supporters will hope that last week marks a new dawn for the club, one which is now in the hands of the fans for the first time since the club’s earliest days in the League of Ireland as Galway Rovers. More than 100 supporters attended a meeting at Terryland Park on Thursday night where a 17-strong management committee was elected to oversee the day-to-day running of the club.

The former board of Nick Leeson, Donal Downes – a solicitor who represented United at the appeal – Colm Feeney and chairman John McCormack are still involved, but only to the extent of managing the club’s bank loans, and will no longer be involved with the running of the club.

For more, read this week's Connacht Sentinel.

See all this week's local soccer coverage on pages 26 & 27