The mystery of Kildare

[manfromdelmonte]

too many Dubs have moved out, ala Meath

if you look at most of the successful GAA clubs in Dublin in the last 20 years, a lot of them are backboned by families originally from outside Dublin, in terms of playing, coaching teams and administration. In both hurling and football.

[LilySavage]

Maybe everyone has a soft spot for Kildare because we can always beat them Some serious players though. Glen Ryan a legend as is Anthony Rainbow. Among others...though Bill Sex was the first Kildare player to catch my attention....(wonder why???)


Sex was unreal in the late 80s/early 90s

[Captain Scarlet]

Just in relation to a thriving club scene the problem is that the club scene isn't great as you can see by the lack of Leinster Club success.
In fact if you look at the big town they are simply not tapping into their population. Club teams like Carbury and Johnstownbridge and are from small rural bases and they would take Naas most days. Round Towers from Kildare Town aren't even senior now.
The big two from Newbridge build on their rivalry and drive it all on. There is a population with a lot of young kids who will come on stream if they are brought in.

[Dinny Breen]

Towers will be back senior next year.

[Captain Scarlet]

Towers will be back senior next year.

I'm sure they said the same last year. As far as I know their Minor team was in the C, or at best B, grade recently. Kilcock are in Intermediate too with all those new houses built in boom times. Point still stands, when people look at our population, it just isn't being harnessed by the clubs in many cases.
Other counties like Roscommon and Cavan are doing so much more with a lot less.

[snoopdog]

Maybe everyone has a soft spot for Kildare because we can always beat them Some serious players though. Glen Ryan a legend as is Anthony Rainbow. Among others...though Bill Sex was the first Kildare player to catch my attention....(wonder why???)


Sex was unreal in the late 80s/early 90s

Especially in the club scene around Athy

[Dinny Breen]

Towers will be back senior next year.

I'm sure they said the same last year. As far as I know their Minor team was in the C, or at best B, grade recently. Kilcock are in Intermediate too with all those new houses built in boom times. Point still stands, when people look at our population, it just isn't being harnessed by the clubs in many cases.
Other counties like Roscommon and Cavan are doing so much more with a lot less.

I know the point you are making and I agree but Towers are a bad example. We won the minor A championship in 2012, beaten by Athy in the A q/f 2013, beaten in the A semi-final in 2014 after giving it a good rattle against that dream Sarsfields team. Played A this year as well. we have also contributed heavily to our successful county minor team over the last 3 years.

Towers have the right manager in place this year. They will win it 

[Donnellys Hollow]

I'd agree with a lot of what Captain Scarlet has outlined above. Outside of Newbridge, only Athy, Celbridge and Confey of the suburban clubs are performing up to their potential and the latter two compete at a high level in both codes which probably doesn't help their chances of competing with the Newbridge clubs.

The Naas club lacks the identity that the Newbridge clubs have. They've been out of the running since the Johnny McDonald was on the scene although their recent Féile success suggests they may finally come good in the years ahead. Like Celbridge and Confey though their dual status might hold them back from a football point of view.

Towers and Kilcock as mentioned earlier have fallen away and have gone from competing at the top of the senior championship to struggling to get out of intermediate in a short space of time. Clane have also been in a sharp decline which is poor from a club who used to backbone the county team. Their minor's and Scoil Mhuire's recent successes need to be built upon.

A lot of Kildare's "newer" population are simply not involved in their local communities to anywhere near the same extent as the first wave of migrants who settled in places like Naas, Celbridge and Leixlip in the early 1980s. They would have mostly been from the counties on the southern and western seaboard whereas now the people settling in Kildare are migrating out from the capital. Generally the more recent migrants spend most of their days commuting and as a result of this commuting culture a lot of them have little involvement locally. This leads to a lack of the same local identity that can be found in the older areas of the towns and in the more rural areas of the county. There needs to be a big drive to get the children of this new population involved in the local clubs.

[Rossfan]

Your last sentence sums it all up DH.
Ye're Clubs should be knocking on every door in these suburban sprawls and let those new people know the GAA club is a Social centre for them.

[Donnellys Hollow]

I suppose the issue for a lot of these clubs is that the local populations have multiplied in only a decade or two. Their clubs have gone from small numbers to trying to cater for thousands in the space of just a few years. Most of these clubs were unprepared and now they don't have the resources or facilities to capitalise on the opportunity that this new population presents. It's a huge contrast with some of the rural clubs in the county who are losing numbers through emigration but it's a problem nonetheless.

[Rossfan]

Is there any fund or development model that Croke Pk can make available?

[heffo]

recent Féile success

With a Dublin manager exported to Naas!

[Ohtoohtobe]

No mystery at all it's just 87 years of poxy refs and injuries.

Seriously though we have a bad habit of squandering the talented groups that do come along. Serious squad in the 70s that didn't bother to train in any serious way and surprise, surprise, were walloped by Dublin in a string of Leinster finals.

If we had held on to Tompkins and Fahy they would have dovetailed nicely with the Ryans, Buckleys and Rainbows coming through in the early 90s and might have made a breakthrough. Instead we stood by and watched them walk out.

In the mid-90s in our infinite wisdom we ran Micko out of the place in 94 despite him being a second away from beating a very decent Dublin team. Abject first round defeats followed in 95 and 96 before we went back to him with immediate improvement and almost an All-Ireland (Galway were just a better side though). But there was no need to waste two years.

We had another good crop of players when McGeeney took over but shot ourselves in the foot again - I honestly think the embarrassment that was the SJ madness was the end of any unity and therefore and chance that team had.

Another talented crop that should peak about 2019 is coming through but a couple are playing Aussie Rules and I would have serious question marks over the attitude of some others. People go on about the money in Kildare but the county is run abysmally, particularly in terms of fundraising.

So two problems:
1) Being run by gobshites (from not organising themselves in the 70s to alienating two superstars in the 80s to getting rid of a manager on the verge of a breakthrough in the 90s to in the 2010s being spineless over Johnston and running the organisation as if it's the 80s and not the 21st century).
2) A losing mentality caused by eight and a half decades of, eh, losing. Too many players who see becoming a county player as the end goal rather than the starting point. 

[seafoid]

No mystery at all it's just 87 years of poxy refs and injuries.

Seriously though we have a bad habit of squandering the talented groups that do come along. Serious squad in the 70s that didn't bother to train in any serious way and surprise, surprise, were walloped by Dublin in a string of Leinster finals.

If we had held on to Tompkins and Fahy they would have dovetailed nicely with the Ryans, Buckleys and Rainbows coming through in the early 90s and might have made a breakthrough. Instead we stood by and watched them walk out.

In the mid-90s in our infinite wisdom we ran Micko out of the place in 94 despite him being a second away from beating a very decent Dublin team. Abject first round defeats followed in 95 and 96 before we went back to him with immediate improvement and almost an All-Ireland (Galway were just a better side though). But there was no need to waste two years.

We had another good crop of players when McGeeney took over but shot ourselves in the foot again - I honestly think the embarrassment that was the SJ madness was the end of any unity and therefore and chance that team had.

Another talented crop that should peak about 2019 is coming through but a couple are playing Aussie Rules and I would have serious question marks over the attitude of some others. People go on about the money in Kildare but the county is run abysmally, particularly in terms of fundraising.

So two problems:
1) Being run by gobshites (from not organising themselves in the 70s to alienating two superstars in the 80s to getting rid of a manager on the verge of a breakthrough in the 90s to in the 2010s being spineless over Johnston and running the organisation as if it's the 80s and not the 21st century).
2) A losing mentality caused by eight and a half decades of, eh, losing. Too many players who see becoming a county player as the end goal rather than the starting point.

That is a fantastically informative post, oohtoohbe. I think it is one of the reasons why I love this site so much. The level of insight is so much better than in the newspapers.

[Rossfan]

Newspapers GAA and other sports usually consists of a string of cliches cobbled together.