Has the talent pool at underage completely dried up?
Or, as I personally suspect, have we for the best part of the last decade employed two full-time football GDAs who have summarily failed to bring through well-rounded footballers on a consistent basis? I do not understand how our GDAs get their yearly contracts renewed every year with no questions asked. Their role seems vague and incompatible with the needs of our adult teams.
Footballers with natural ability like the Kingstons, Moores, O' Carrolls etc will always come through but even despite their own fine talents, they each have deficits in certain areas. Have they and their likes gotten the coaching they would have received in say Tipperary?
It's perplexing looking at our underage development panels and the lack of consistency and cohesive planning. No defensive blueprint, no basic starting blocks in terms of work rate or graft and then history repeating itself every couple of years with promising teams getting turned over in the hot heat of Championship battle at minor or u21 level.
I know it's easy beat on County Boards and Officials who at the end of the day are volunteers but there's something rotten within Laois GAA. At best it's basic ineptitude; at worst it's wilful negligence.
Or, as I personally suspect, have we for the best part of the last decade employed two full-time football GDAs who have summarily failed to bring through well-rounded footballers on a consistent basis? I do not understand how our GDAs get their yearly contracts renewed every year with no questions asked. Their role seems vague and incompatible with the needs of our adult teams.
Footballers with natural ability like the Kingstons, Moores, O' Carrolls etc will always come through but even despite their own fine talents, they each have deficits in certain areas. Have they and their likes gotten the coaching they would have received in say Tipperary?
It's perplexing looking at our underage development panels and the lack of consistency and cohesive planning. No defensive blueprint, no basic starting blocks in terms of work rate or graft and then history repeating itself every couple of years with promising teams getting turned over in the hot heat of Championship battle at minor or u21 level.
I know it's easy beat on County Boards and Officials who at the end of the day are volunteers but there's something rotten within Laois GAA. At best it's basic ineptitude; at worst it's wilful negligence.