15 year old Offaly boy not allowed to hurl??

[northsideboy]

That's not new. Sure that goes on in the GAA as well. Not sure what point you are making there Tony, to be honest.

Young lads are told not to play football for their clubs by the school?
Where does that happen?

If anything I have witnessed the other way happen.

[Zulu]

I've grown tired of these "appeals" that crop up on occasion in that almost all the time they are not being prevented from playing (they are just restricted to playing for certain clubs within the confines of the rules that every player is subject to), and the full story isn't being told.

I think that's hiding behind language rather than accepting the reality. Of course we don't know the full story in any of these cases and whether this one is a genuine case or not I don't know but rules that prevent any kid playing with a club he wants to in all circumstances are dubious to say the least. I'm not arguing that there shouldn't be eligibility rules, I'm arguing that they shouldn't be so sacrosanct that a county boards hands are tied even when any logical person would feel the kid should be allowed to transfer.

Incidently if restrictions on playing for a certain club at a certain age level should be removed, should this privilege also be extended at county level at the same age level? Many young talented players go to school in a different county from the one they live in, so if not why not?

County teams don't start until U14, I would suggest that allowing kids to play with their friends is more of a U8/10 type of thing. Besides, you might only have one or two friends from school on a county team and only play a few games with a county team prior to minor at which point playing with your mates is certainly no justification for a transfer.

[johnneycool]

The parish rule is more often than not designed to prevent big clubs poaching the better players from small clubs and even that doesn't work all the time.
If the young fella has been playing with Birr since he started and never played for Crinkill even if he lived within the boundaries as its not as if anyone knew whether he'd be good, bad or indifferent at hurling.

Was the lad 'poached' from Crinkill?

[AZOffaly]

In this case, it appears to me that Birr are chancing their arm. They knew right well what the boundary was, and as I said the agreement was there since 2003, when this lad was 3 years of age or so.

The family appear to be steeped in the Birr club, and it is just not credible that they thought there was no issue with this, and certainly the Birr club would have known.

So now they have a cause celebre to take to the nation, on the exact same day, with the exact same reporter, that they also release a story saying they are pushing the DRA to hold a hearing on their appeal about the very same rule.

It's a PR stunt to bolster their case.

All that being said, I have no issue if the GAA allow counties to adjudicate what amounts to common sense on other cases. Certainly the Kerry case is a lot more nuanced.

[Lone Shark]

Lads you can't have rules that leave scope for "common sense", primarily because what's common sense to one person might me a daft idea to another - and that's before you take into account the bias that will always be inherent in disputes between clubs. By all means use common sense when framing the rules, but there needs to be hard and fast rules to work with, otherwise there will be those who will look to take advantage. Common sense is a lovely idea in theory, but it just doesn't work in practice.

Imagine trying to police speeding on the roads by common sense? We all think it's a good idea, but if you get five people in a room and ask them what's the right speed limit for a dual carraigeway on a wet day, you'll get five different answers.


In this case, let's be clear here for those who don't get it - the child in question lives in the heart of Crinkill. Crinkill is part of Birr parish and didn't exist until 1981, and when it was founded it was for junior and adults only - by rule, it wasn't allowed get promoted to senior. They only started fielding underage in 2003, when the boundary was drawn up, and then in 2009 (I think) they were granted the right to gain promotion, which is still a bit away but could be realistic in five or six years. They won a minor "B" championship last year and would be competitive at "B" level all down the ages.


Birr don't agree with this boundary and feel that they should still be allowed to pick from the whole parish, and so are contesting that concept, as they are entitled to do  - but the rule remains in place and the only reason that the child in question wants to hurl with Birr is because he has done so this far, due to the influence of his mother and grandfather. I he had been brought to Crinkill club initially, as he should have been, he would have been in with most of his national school friends, would have been closer to home, and this never would have arisen.

[AZOffaly]

LS, how about a law that says all underage transfers must be voted on by a county board meeting, and the county board has the power to ratify transfers to underage clubs where the vote of the members feels that there is a valid, child welfare, reason for doing so.

[Lone Shark]

AZ, much like the common sense idea, that works great in theory, until you see how it goes in practice. My experience is that clubs will vote out of self interest, and it doesn't matter how ridiculous it sounds, there will always be a self-interest angle to be found if you dig deep enough.

If you put a system in place like that, what would happen is that clubs wouldn't look at it in terms of right and wrong, they'd look at it in terms of how it's likely to affect them. For example, Tullamore would possibly vote with Birr while Durrow and Ballinamere might vote with Crinkill because of parallels in their situations. Another club might vote for Birr to be seen to lend their support so that Birr would let them borrow the field for a challenge match, while another club might vote for Crinkill because they've a league match coming up against Crinkill and they want it moved because of a stag do, and they want to do Crinkill a favour in advance in order to grease the wheels.

An independent subcommittee might work, but it would have to be people of the highest integrity that couldn't be questioned, your Brendan Wards and the like. Otherwise it would become a trading shop. 

[AZOffaly]

Well maybe that's the way forward. I agree club politics would be hard to avoid if it was just an open county board vote, but maybe a committee like that, independent of the clubs if you like, would be the best way forward. You'd only have to convene them to examine contentious transfers, not to rubber stamp all transfers that are uncontested.

[AZOffaly]

By the way, in this case, I'm convinced Birr have engineered, or at least taken advantage of, a situation where they can use a public case to further their challenge to the rule. There's no way the parties in this were caught by surprise that the young lad was not legal for Birr.

To have another, 'unrelated', article in the same paper on the same day about their battle with the DRA about the rule was so obvious I can't believe they did it that way.

[deiseach]

One death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic, as Stalin didn't say. The reason I bring up this quote is that the only way you can keep every individual person happy when it comes to the club they play with is if you have a free-for-all. When that's the case, you never have people running to the press wailing about how cruel the system is. Of course in a free-for-all you'll have groups of individuals, i.e. clubs, who are extremely put out by the situation. But who gives two hoots about a club when set against the needs/wants of Tiny Tim? Now, I have to emphasis that there's nothing wrong with advocating a free-for-all. I just wish those arguing for it would be honest about it rather than using hard cases to bring about change and pretending that any such change would not have a disruptive effect.

[Lone Shark]

By the way, in this case, I'm convinced Birr have engineered, or at least taken advantage of, a situation where they can use a public case to further their challenge to the rule. There's no way the parties in this were caught by surprise that the young lad was not legal for Birr.

To have another, 'unrelated', article in the same paper on the same day about their battle with the DRA about the rule was so obvious I can't believe they did it that way.

I'm not entirely sure, simply because Birr have taken a bath on bringing a similar case to this to the DRA before and could have been driven to penury if they had been hit for costs. I can't be sure, but I suspect that the mother/grandfather is fuelling this push, and that nobody in Birr committee is strong enough to stand up to a senior figure like him and say that they don't want to stand behind it. As things stand, unless there's a lot more to this than meets the eye, they're going to end up with suspensions for Chair and Secretary, and possibly a large fine and a big legal bill as well.

I'm only speculating, but one story, pushed by the mother, could easily have precipitated a call to the club, which created the parallel story, so to speak. 

[Zulu]

Imagine trying to police speeding on the roads by common sense? We all think it's a good idea, but if you get five people in a room and ask them what's the right speed limit for a dual carraigeway on a wet day, you'll get five different answers.

I don't think that's the correct analogy LS, I'd view it more as having the 40kph speed zone but the guards not hanging a guy for going 41kph. The rule is there but common sense dictates that it shouldn't be applied in such cases even though they have technically broken the law like the guy who does 70kph in a 40 zone.

An independent committee, like you suggested, is what I'd have in mind. If counties can't find an ethical committee then you should have leave to Croke Park.

[deiseach]

I don't think that's the correct analogy LS, I'd view it more as having the 40kph speed zone but the guards not hanging a guy for going 41kph. The rule is there but common sense dictates that it shouldn't be applied in such cases even though they have technically broken the law like the guy who does 70kph in a 40 zone.

Do the guards hang people for breaking the speed limit these days? The whistle blower didn't mention that!

[Zulu]

Call me old fashioned Deiseach but hanging is the proper punishment for any offence!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlSjBAQixGI

[deiseach]

Call me old fashioned Deiseach but hanging is the proper punishment for any offence!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlSjBAQixGI

I don't know why everyone gasps in those scenes. What were they expecting, the archangel Michael to come down from on high and cut the rope in mid-drop with the sword with which he wounded Satan?