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Bit surprised at the Bellaghy chairman saying it would probably never happen in a south Derry club. I hope he's wrong.

Given his background, I would have been extremely surprised if he said anything else.

I think the Coleraine spokeman is more in line with majority thinking.

[If they have a letter/email from county board official then they are in the clear. They cannot be blamed for a county board mistake.]

http://www.ulsterherald.com/2012/09/06/tyrone-gaa-to-investigate-dromore-player-eligibility/

Seems to be some confusing signs over the last 24 hours as to wherever Sludden was actually eligible to come on as a sub. If it turns out that Dromore played him on the basis of a formal letter/email from a county board official who misinterpreted the rule book, the excrement is going to hit the blower.

If they have a letter/email from county board official then they are in the clear. They cannot be blamed for a county board mistake.

If they have no official notification then they are fooked

Have they actually been officially excluded or is it still under investigation?

I'm not so certain - I can't think of such an incident in the GAA itself in recent times, but I remember a decade ago in ladies football Monaghan Harps had their Ulster senior club title stripped off them and awarded to Carrickmore (whom they beat in the final) after one of their players was found ineligible, not through the club's fault but because the Monaghan registrar failed to get the player registration to the national registrar in Croke Park in time and in ladies football at least, you're not an eligible player for a team until it is processed by the national registrar. Since the rule that is alleged to be breached is not a county bye-law but in the official guide, and the county board may or may not be in a position to give an unequivocal guarantee even if they formally notified the club, especially due to the implications of the Ulster & All-Ireland club championships. This is a kind of unknown territory, any recent examples elsewhere might help clear this up.

How did the issue with Ballinderry playing an u-14 player in the UMFCC (St Pauls tournament) play out?

Not an officially sanctioned tournament I think.

Good thread.

If there are only two levels, i.e. Senior and Juvenile, then there is a case to answer and Dromore could be thrown out.

Not an expert, but in adult competition, I would have thought that Senior, Intermediate, Junior, under-21 and Minor are all different levels. Therefore, IMO Dromore should be fine.

Personally, if I was from Ardboe, I'd be hittin a powerful reddener that this is even being pursued by the club.

The 'spat' was merely Kenny losing the head because I suggested, via the Antrim twitter feed (@clubaontroma) that he may not have seen too many matches as he only selected his version of the All Stars from 3 out of 9 counties. He didn't take kindly to that and wrote an outrageous piece in the paper calling me a 'clown' a 'troll' and a 'carper'. It was an overreaction by any standards, in my view anyway.

Kenny made an awful clown of himself in that article. Haven't got a copy, but IIRC he stated that he had been to 7 of the 8 Ulster championship matches, two qualifiers and none of the quarterfinals (because he was on holidays that weekend - would a serious journalist book holidays for the biggest weekend of the championship?). He claimed he preferred to pick players from matches he saw. So he saw neither of the Derry games, 33% of Cavan games and 25% of Antrim matches. Yet, he claims a couple of Antrim players came close to selection. He had problems about the anonymity of the tweet, but it was clear that he already knew the identity of the tweeter as did many, many others; any who didn't certainly do now. He also made it clear that he didn't have a Twitter account, yet is getting exorcised by something posted on Twitter. But the worst part was the veiled threat at the end.

No-one I know has even attempted to argue that Archer's column had any journalist integrity.

Another fecking white Elephant. Only a single game a year is likely to even trouble the 30k mark. The GAA has to learn that building out-sized stadiums only results in destroying the athmosphere of almost every game played there. And once something like this is built it becomes a clusterf**k to try and get as many games played in it as possible just to service the mountain of the debt it generated.

The only way this makes sense is for EVERY Ulster football championship game to be played in those bleak and unwelcoming soccer-city suburbs - otherwise you are looking at ONE game a year attracting 20,000 plus.
Meantime the money ploughed into the ego projects that are unused Pairc Esler, Morgan Armagh, Celtic Park (near Brandywell), Brutal Brewster, Kingspan's empty terraces and Ohmygod Omagh looks more ridiculous every day.
And not only are the Ulster GAA mandarins who plan and delievr these monsrtrous waste of resources smiling patronisingly at us from the pages of the Irish News - we are giving them bloody hero status. Daft beyond words.
In a few years the tumbleweed of disuse will fill the so-called stadia across the province.
Croke Park depends on Jedward, Notre Dame, the Euharistic Congess and the like to survive. Maybe we can get the latest  Carlisle Circus crazies to fill Casement for a few jousts.

I agree to a certain extent (minus the drama) with your sentiments. However, what is your solution?

Say Down draw Tyrone and Armagh draw Donegal next June and both want home matches. What would you do?

They play on different Sundays, as is currently the case.

What's Jim Gavin like?

Says much more about his father. Utterly incapable of performing the role that he is receiving TV license payers' money for. If he is not capable of a semblance of impartiality, then he shouldn't be anywhere near our screens.

On the other hand, unlike his vastly overrated son, he is old enough to remember 2009.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Slu23kGEw48

Kerry Mike's father John.

RIP

Had never read it before and 'tis an awful let down. The only funny bit is the irony when you see the birds some of the main contributors to the thread ended up marrying.

40,000 all seater stadium. I reckon Casement will be hosting the Ulster finals from now on then. Sounds class.

As it should be. May Clones be consigned to the dustbin of history.

Hopefully when the Stadium is finished it will boost attendances in the county, which have been flagging seriously. Would be nice to have a bumper crowd for a county final, or even a championship match for once. If they build up enough anticipation and knock the design out of the park it could be massive for the future of Antrim and Ulster GAA.

A 40K stadium would be the worst place to play an Antrim county final. Take her up the country. Creggan, Loughgiel, Dunloy, Ballymena, Hannahstown.

Would Lenny's nephews play for him?

Semi-literate gombeen former gaaboard poster longball has reinvented himself on the board and is posting away with a new username. Starting threads and everything.

If you trace their respective family trees back far enough, I bet you will find that Neil Armstrong was related to Lance Armstrong.

Exactly.

I didn't get the paper but saw it was rumbling on yesterday on twitter. I know that Antrim twitter account said something like Archer mustn't have been to too many games this year going by his selections. What did Archer say?

He called him a twit in the headline

It is unlikely that Archer wrote the headline, but he certainly made a bigger twit of himself with the article. So many holes in all his points and what appeared to be a veiled threat in the last paragraph. Very unprofessional in my opinion.

Exhibit One.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8226075.stm