Drug testing in the GAA may be introduced to clubs

[Armagh18]

Gaa can't enforce drug testing for a amateur organisation with no paid. Even at county level I found it strange they signed up for the Irish drug testing programme to allow gaa players to get funding. What you do for the power lifter smoked to the gills who plays football at the weekend for the. Craic. I love to do a drugs test in my gym to see what the hell half them are on, put a well built Gaelic footballer or rubgy player to shame. Any young lad I talking to who filled out very noticed over the year, all are on creatine at the mininium, baacs, protein power. The big conditioned lads who bench over 180kg, Squat 260+ and deadlift 280+, all well beyond 90% of Gaelic footballers are capable of.

nothing wrong with protein powder or creatine in fact most footballers or anyone looking to keep in shape will take them. Bccas are proven to be shite and a waste of money

[redzone]

Cocaine is a massive societal problem in the UK and Ireland at the minute. Something needs done.

Is it the job of the GAA to do it though?

It's not their job but whose is it? 

The resources are not there for the police/gardai to deal with it and the country is flooded with it. 

It's near more acceptable now to use cocaine than to go out for a smoke.

There was a bunch of suicides in an area in Cavan the last few years and everyone was putting in down to mental health and lockdowns but when the surface was scratched there was a drug problem and one of the lads who was doing the supplying was  a highly though off member of the GAA team and former county player.

where abouts was this in Cavan? I ever knew this

Massive problems in Cavan with drugs which are no doubt related to the sucides. There's heroin in towns you would never thought of and that's from the Anglo Celt paper.
To say it's nothing to do with the Gaa is wrong. It's only right we step in and help if there's a problem, or better still get to the young ones before they even get a chance to try them.

[Armagh18]

Agreed redzone. Massive dangers from drugs are faced by young people and we as individuals and the gaa as a whole need to be doing all we can to protect them, I know a lot of work is going on to combat not only drug addiction but gambling which is a huge one as well, quite a few high profile gaa players were hit by that one, McConville and McCarron probably the 2 best known. Lad from Westmeath who's name escapes me has spoke openly about his drug addiction and how it nearly killed him.

Think we need to be getting through to lads/lassies from 15/16 right through to early 20's.

[square_ball]

Agreed redzone. Massive dangers from drugs are faced by young people and we as individuals and the gaa as a whole need to be doing all we can to protect them, I know a lot of work is going on to combat not only drug addiction but gambling which is a huge one as well, quite a few high profile gaa players were hit by that one, McConville and McCarron probably the 2 best known. Lad from Westmeath who's name escapes me has spoke openly about his drug addiction and how it nearly killed him.

Think we need to be getting through to lads/lassies from 15/16 right through to early 20's.

Luke Loughlin is the fella. A real rags to riches type of story. Won the Tailtean Cup with Westmeath and now playing a starring role with his club in the Leinster Club. I have read a bit about him over the last while and it was a pretty scary path he was going down before getting himself straightened out.

[Milltown Row2]

Kids or young adults will nearly all try it at some stage, that's life, allowing it to be the norm will be the problem, testing at clubs will not stop people trying it either, will probably stop lads playing in fairness.

Work with them and educate, it's not going away so its about making sure there is support when needed

My daughter works in a Belfast bar/club whatever place in Belfast, its as common among staff as customers.

To be fair it was 30+ years ago when we headed into town, and a generation before that were taking other pills, the troubles in fairness reduced things in comparison to maybe Dublin or London but lets not kid ourselves our dads probably delved into things at a time

[Armagh18]

Kids or young adults will nearly all try it at some stage, that's life, allowing it to be the norm will be the problem, testing at clubs will not stop people trying it either, will probably stop lads playing in fairness.

Work with them and educate, it's not going away so its about making sure there is support when needed

My daughter works in a Belfast bar/club whatever place in Belfast, its as common among staff as customers.

To be fair it was 30+ years ago when we headed into town, and a generation before that were taking other pills, the troubles in fairness reduced things in comparison to maybe Dublin or London but lets not kid ourselves our dads probably delved into things at a time

It wouldn't have been as totally normalised as now, personally never tried it myself, know lads that took stuff once and then said nope not for me, know others who took it for a while but wised up and straightened themselves out, then also a few that would be the sort would take it every week multiple nights.

Something that's not been mentioned yet is the attraction having a bag of stuff can have in terms of attracting women, plenty of young girls as bad or worse than the lads for it.

[Armagh18]

Agreed redzone. Massive dangers from drugs are faced by young people and we as individuals and the gaa as a whole need to be doing all we can to protect them, I know a lot of work is going on to combat not only drug addiction but gambling which is a huge one as well, quite a few high profile gaa players were hit by that one, McConville and McCarron probably the 2 best known. Lad from Westmeath who's name escapes me has spoke openly about his drug addiction and how it nearly killed him.

Think we need to be getting through to lads/lassies from 15/16 right through to early 20's.

Luke Loughlin is the fella. A real rags to riches type of story. Won the Tailtean Cup with Westmeath and now playing a starring role with his club in the Leinster Club. I have read a bit about him over the last while and it was a pretty scary path he was going down before getting himself straightened out.

Yeah thats the lad. Seems a decent fella too, fair play to him for getting sorted out. I'd say he could tell a few stories that'd scare young ones away from that path alright.

[Ethan Tremblay]

I suppose I am coming to the end of my career and I have seen it seep in from the start to, how it is in fact normalized now. 

One guy 15 years ago within our team was known for taking cocaine, it was an open secret.  Multiple players threatened to walk away unless he was told by management to go.  Last season, we got beat, went on the drink, and a fair few of the players (50% plus) were away off to the toilets of the pub to enjoy themselves. 

With the younger ones (that is the boys in their late teens, early twenties) attitudes (and I am going off my experience within my own club here), introducing drug policies may discourage them from playing altogether, if they run the risk of their family finding out etc. 

[NAG1]

I think we have to look maybe more at the positive side of this from a GAA perspective and actually be a little proud.

Think of what our small towns and villages would be like without the positive influence of the GAA. The positive focus this gives to our young people, the lessons and the life skills being involved in any capacity gives them. People accuse the GAA of being money oriented and bemoan the public funding that goes into the GAA North and South, but take that structure away from our local areas and how much would the governments need to pay to get a tiny percentage of the social return?

Of course as an organisation we can do our bit to help the awareness and education about drugs, but by having our young people in positive life affirming social environments we are already doing more than we are given the credit for.

I don't ever see testing coming into the clubs side of things, but we as members will continue to do our bit in our local clubs for our young ones and try to help them when and where we can.

[trailer]

If you are going to ruin your life you will. No matter if it is drugs, alcohol, gambling. In many cases that person was destined to be a f**king disaster. If it wasn't drugs it would be alcohol or gambling or something else. Eradicating drugs isn't the answer nor is it the whole problem.

[Armagh18]

If you are going to ruin your life you will. No matter if it is drugs, alcohol, gambling. In many cases that person was destined to be a f**king disaster. If it wasn't drugs it would be alcohol or gambling or something else. Eradicating drugs isn't the answer nor is it the whole problem.

Should we not try to help people? Be it with education or in a lot of cases a kick up the hole to wise them up?

[trailer]

If you are going to ruin your life you will. No matter if it is drugs, alcohol, gambling. In many cases that person was destined to be a f**king disaster. If it wasn't drugs it would be alcohol or gambling or something else. Eradicating drugs isn't the answer nor is it the whole problem.

Should we not try to help people? Be it with education or in a lot of cases a kick up the hole to wise them up?

Yes absolutely. The point I am making rather clumsily is that drugs isn't the whole problem.

[Baile Brigín 2]

This would be entirely illegal. There are no contracts and the reason the county players are tested is because they get grants from the Olympics fund.

Also all this talk of 'helping' players. You don't do that by publically banning them for smoking a joint

[Baile Brigín 2]

If you are going to ruin your life you will. No matter if it is drugs, alcohol, gambling. In many cases that person was destined to be a f**king disaster. If it wasn't drugs it would be alcohol or gambling or something else. Eradicating drugs isn't the answer nor is it the whole problem.

Should we not try to help people? Be it with education or in a lot of cases a kick up the hole to wise them up?

a kick in the hole from the mamager in private or a public kick in the hole that employers can see?

[general_lee]

Alcohol is a much bigger problem than cocaine will ever be

completely disagree. Alcohol will do you little or no harm in moderation.

So will coke.

Visit any casualty dept on a w/e night; for eevry drug problem there will be 100 alcohol problems. It's reckoned that 1 in 6 people in Ireland is miserable because of alcohol, either a problem themselves or someone close to them

Alcohol is of course the worst drug. Even in small doses some people can't hack it. You're absolutely right, every weekend some **** will be carted off to hospital due to the effects of alcohol.