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There's 110 miles between Drumcliff and Kilcoo.

Surely this has to be a record distance for a voluntary club manager to travel?

It's not as far away as the griping above would make you believe.

There won't be a perfect system. There won't even be a close to perfect system. You can't stop stars aligning.

Three simple measures should be easy to implement across the board:

1. When a club wins its county's IFC or JFC, for the subsequent season, they must play at a higher championship level. This stipulation supersedes all localised competition rules.

2. If a club's senior league position at the end of any season, ranks them in 10th place or higher, then they must compete in their county's SFC the following season. This stipulation supersedes all localised competition rules.

3. If a club's senior league position at the end of any season, ranks them in 20th place or higher, then they cannot play in their county's JFC the following season. This stipulation supersedes all localised competition rules.


No. 1 is a no-brainer.

Nos. 2 and 3 could run into logistics issues in smaller counties, but in those cases the ranges could be adapted accordingly.

I know I know I know that in some in counties they don't take league football seriously. But you know what? There's clubs everywhere forking out a fortune for management teams and toys all year round. The least they could do in return is try harder in league football.

Twitter wants to blame the coach and the committee for this nonsense.

But the reality is that it's only possible to come up with a set of rules like this if there's a core of players driving it.

Do you think so?? Jesus I'd hope not you'd hope that you're able to reason most of the above out with your team mates. Also why would you banish someone who's heading away? Surely if they're good enough you keep them until they go?


I may be wrong but I'm pretty sure Glen have had a few lads travelling at different stages in the past few years and haven't subscribed to the above nonsense.

No soccer or golf? Jesus!

Also whatever about the nonsense of it how is this being circulated? You'd have it on a powerpoint or get the lads to sign a hard copy at a meeting there's no way that should be available for distribution around Ireland!

I just don't think it's possible for a coach to implement this culture from anything approaching scratch. It has to be the wishes of a core of players, who will then drive it.

That core of players doesn't mean all players by the way. It'll be principally made up of deluded older players who reckon that young people don't have the discipline and love of the game, that they have. And that's the only reason they're not winning county championships.

Twitter wants to blame the coach and the committee for this nonsense.

But the reality is that it's only possible to come up with a set of rules like this if there's a core of players driving it.

These people can be both complete scumbags as well as be canaries in the coal mine.

Mass immigration (emphasis on the mass) when it lands on your door step doesn't appear to be all it's cracked up to be (unless you're a making money out of the scheme) but governments have told us we're not allowed to think that or indeed be allowed talk about the potentially very reasonable positions they might have on the topic.

Couldn't agree more.

A government worried about getting re-elected, an under-qualified and lazy mainstream media, and a needy conspiracy theory community have (largely unwittingly) joined forces to create and promote a fictional Irish far right movement of strength and influence, and use the political spectrum as their stock response for citizen unrest.

The Irish far right movement has as much influence on people as my puppy.

I don't honestly think this is facism or extremism at play.

There's the bored youths pushing the boundaries. There's a pitchfork wielding mob that have neither the brains nor the interest to consider why they swing their pitchforks; it's just what they do. There's the vile, opportunistic scum making hay from the madness.

But the underlying current that has swollen and caused this, I genuinely believed, is fuelled by a housing crisis that has become a time bomb. The working classes and middle classes are getting financially obliterated in Dublin, as a direct cost of rent and housing. And that means it is not the right time for government to be taking in tens of thousands of refugees.

Refugees have a limited effect on the housing market. Immigration by well paid people in Intel or Google may well have more effect as these people can afford the rent. However, this group are paying their way and are paying for the scumbags who are looting Dublin tonight.

Whether refugees have a limited effect on the housing market is irrelevant.

What is relevant is that there's a rising tide of Irish people whose only opportunity to continue living where they're from, is to hand over the vast majority of their income to landlords (or, if they're lucky, to a bank). The government has taken almost no steps to prevent this happening.

But at the same time, the government is housing, feeding and paying people to come into the country, not to work.

As a policy it doesn't run along parallel lines with the housing crisis. But it does present any Irish person who is enduring financial struggles and concerns about their future, with a pretty rational reason to distrust their government, and the longer it continues, too begin hating their government. When a sizeable group of people of this mindset are found in the same area, plenty of them will be bored, plenty of them will be pitchfork wielders by nature and plenty of them will be vile scum. Meaning that peaceful protests will only go one way. It's a tinderbox just waiting for a spark. 

Pinning what has happened here on the far right, or on racism or extremism, well I think that's a cop out, and one that leans too heavily on the polarised culture of across the Atlantic. There's a closer-to-home problem running through Dublin today.

Giggs a flair player?

Maybe for his first 2-3 seasons. After that he was a solid, team-first player with a touch of class. And that's not a criticism.

I don't honestly think this is facism or extremism at play.

There's the bored youths pushing the boundaries. There's a pitchfork wielding mob that have neither the brains nor the interest to consider why they swing their pitchforks; it's just what they do. There's the vile, opportunistic scum making hay from the madness.

But the underlying current that has swollen and caused this, I genuinely believed, is fuelled by a housing crisis that has become a time bomb. The working classes and middle classes are getting financially obliterated in Dublin, as a direct cost of rent and housing. And that means it is not the right time for government to be taking in tens of thousands of refugees.

Roy Keane had a few issues, but one one those was not being limited skill wise.

In always favouring a 15-yard pass to where his teammate was running, over a 70-yard hollywood ball that would require his teammate to slow then take 2 touches, it meant he never would have Steven Gerrard's highlights reel... but it also made him the better (and much more bemedalled) player.

Playing numbers and football long culture are of course key drivers.

But I'm really not sure how the wealth of a person's nation could be any kind of factor in their potential/desire to become a high-level athlete.

Hunger isn't set at a national, regional, local or group level. It comes from within.

People constantly gurning about money and investment.

The laziest of arguments.

Having a professional league with a long history and some bloody big clubs, has done little to stop Scotland's slide into a tier 3 international football team.

Ireland has more players in the EPL than Scotland this season.

Having a weak domestic league, low wages and a rudimentary infrastructure hasn't stopped the Ivory Coast, Ghana, Senegal and Mali all producing players (and international teams) that are clearly superior to Ireland.


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Ireland had a long summer of good players in the 80s and 90s. Punched way above our weight for 20 years.

Now we're wintering.

Summer will happen again sometime.

It's meant to elite level sport fellas. McClean had to work harder because he'd below average technique, and a below average first touch; as such he was rarely in control of the ball. He had to charge around at full tilt with sweat beating out of him as he'd below average pace, and almost no ability to read or take charge of the game.

Some of you would be better off watching dog fighting.

Journeyman footballer gets a retirement ball, with a 100 cap legacy somehow safely tucked away.

It's a sorry state of affairs for Irish soccer. It really is.

I doubt I'll ever reach a point where I'd vote Sinn Fein. I just prefer a middle ground government.

But yesterday's Twitter pile-on in reaction to Mary Lou was excruciating to read. Ireland's most pious, intolerant, inconsistent and revolting mouthpieces were out in force. Those people actually deserve a term or two under Sinn Fein. It might just wake them up a little.

Mitchels woes surrounding how and why they lost access to the now Pairc Esler pre-date me.

I'd assume what happened there, and the lack of a definable home, was likely linked to losing a cohort of quality players that would have peaked in the late 1980s like DJ Kane,  Martin Lynch and Martin Durkan

I do remember them starting again with youth teams in the mid-eighties, so I'm assuming the whole club was close to collapsing early 1980s

At that time they played their football out of the council facilities known as the Donkey Fields, which was far from luxurious but it was handy got to for hundreds of houses.

When the Donkey Fields were reclaimed by the council (late 1990s I believe) to become part of Greenbank Industrial Estate, this would have left them homeless again, only they were rehoused in what became Gerry Brown Park.

Although located perhaps only half a mile from the Donkey Fields, I'd think this was the move that condemned the Mitchels to death by a thousand cuts.

I know they were desperate for a home field, and their intentions were for the best. But because the nearest chimney pot was (and will always be) a mile away, it was impossible to generate a community spirit around the club. And because the only way to get to Gerry Brown park involved passing a GAA stadium and a soccer stadium, to arrive at a portakabin, it was always going to be difficult to attract youth players unless they'd family ties to the club.

With Shamrocks, Ballyholland and even those crafty Burren buggers laying claim to the Warrenpoint Road area, the conveyor belt slowed up then creaked, then ground to a halt.

It was obvious a decade ago that Mitchels were going to run out of players before long. It's been about 6 years since they last fielded a team at any juvenile level. And attempts to make the seniors into a style of "social football" team were always going to fail. Social footballers don't drive the length of the county on Friday evenings to play D4 football.

It's an awful shame for the committed players and administrators they've had over the years. Some great people.

The bottom line reality is you can't have a GAA club without a community to support it: