Antrim Hurling

[NAG1]

i went to school in ballymena and basketball was treated better than hurling was. football was a bloody joke! we had fellas from dunloy and loughgiel in the team and were decent players, all who played senior county and won antrim championships yet nothing was done to help or promote the game.

i mind having to beg teachers to allow me to play for the school lol

I think I played two hurling games for my school the whole time I was there and it had the pick of the three ards clubs as well as a couple of handy hurlers from Kilclief.

We'd play far more gaelic football even though only one lad played club football.

Assuming the county board has no say in school curricula  whose agenda was pushed here as I assume the parents would have wanted hurling played?

What schools are represented in the Ulster Colleges Combined Squad?

Schools after school sport is mainly down to the interests of the teachers, they are giving up their time, mainly for no extra reward. So if you get a PE teacher who has an interest in Basketball, Soccer, Badminton you name it then the likelihood is that the school will follow that route.
This is where the development officers are supposed to be providing the link between local clubs to the schools to help get people into them to help out with the teams and create a strong GAA element within the schools. This is clearly not happening. Cant blame the schools for everything with restricted budgets etc, we are the GAA if we want GAA promoted in schools then we have to do our bit to do so.

[Tony Baloney]

i went to school in ballymena and basketball was treated better than hurling was. football was a bloody joke! we had fellas from dunloy and loughgiel in the team and were decent players, all who played senior county and won antrim championships yet nothing was done to help or promote the game.

i mind having to beg teachers to allow me to play for the school lol

I think I played two hurling games for my school the whole time I was there and it had the pick of the three ards clubs as well as a couple of handy hurlers from Kilclief.

We'd play far more gaelic football even though only one lad played club football.

Assuming the county board has no say in school curricula  whose agenda was pushed here as I assume the parents would have wanted hurling played?

What schools are represented in the Ulster Colleges Combined Squad?

Schools after school sport is mainly down to the interests of the teachers, they are giving up their time, mainly for no extra reward. So if you get a PE teacher who has an interest in Basketball, Soccer, Badminton you name it then the likelihood is that the school will follow that route.
This is where the development officers are supposed to be providing the link between local clubs to the schools to help get people into them to help out with the teams and create a strong GAA element within the schools. This is clearly not happening. Cant blame the schools for everything with restricted budgets etc, we are the GAA if we want GAA promoted in schools then we have to do our bit to do so.

I think it is fair to say that most serious sports schools only employ like-minded PE teachers. It is no coincidence that grammar schools are heavily staffed by ex-county players.

[johnneycool]

i went to school in ballymena and basketball was treated better than hurling was. football was a bloody joke! we had fellas from dunloy and loughgiel in the team and were decent players, all who played senior county and won antrim championships yet nothing was done to help or promote the game.

i mind having to beg teachers to allow me to play for the school lol

I think I played two hurling games for my school the whole time I was there and it had the pick of the three ards clubs as well as a couple of handy hurlers from Kilclief.

We'd play far more gaelic football even though only one lad played club football.

Assuming the county board has no say in school curricula  whose agenda was pushed here as I assume the parents would have wanted hurling played?

What schools are represented in the Ulster Colleges Combined Squad?

I suppose back then there was no competition within the county, so we'd have had to enter into some Belfast schools competition or the other which would possibly have been easier and cheaper to enter than trapse across on a ferry boat to Castlewellan, Kilkeel, Downpatrick, Warrenpoint and the likes for football games.
The PE teacher's main sport was gaelic football although he was heavily involved in his local hurling clubs senior team at the time.

I  think the Down combined colleges team consists of everyone not playing for St Pats Knock, of an age I'm not sure about.

The wing managed them so I'd expect it was a county board led project rather than anything driven from within the schools and colleges involved.

[Tony Baloney]

i went to school in ballymena and basketball was treated better than hurling was. football was a bloody joke! we had fellas from dunloy and loughgiel in the team and were decent players, all who played senior county and won antrim championships yet nothing was done to help or promote the game.

i mind having to beg teachers to allow me to play for the school lol

I think I played two hurling games for my school the whole time I was there and it had the pick of the three ards clubs as well as a couple of handy hurlers from Kilclief.

We'd play far more gaelic football even though only one lad played club football.

Assuming the county board has no say in school curricula  whose agenda was pushed here as I assume the parents would have wanted hurling played?

What schools are represented in the Ulster Colleges Combined Squad?

I suppose back then there was no competition within the county, so we'd have had to enter into some Belfast schools competition or the other which would possibly have been easier and cheaper to enter than trapse across on a ferry boat to Castlewellan, Kilkeel, Downpatrick, Warrenpoint and the likes for football games.
The PE teacher's main sport was gaelic football although he was heavily involved in his local hurling clubs senior team at the time.

I  think the Down combined colleges team consists of everyone not playing for St Pats Knock, of an age I'm not sure about.

The wing managed them so I'd expect it was a county board led project rather than anything driven from within the schools and colleges involved.

I meant this new Ulster Colleges Combined Squad to play in the All-Ireland Colleges A competition rather than the usual O'Keefe Cup. I read yesterday that Sean McGourty was managing them.

[theskull1]

Conversations should be taking place between county boards and schools on a regular basis. The argument needs to be made that they have a sizeable number of hurlers and/or footballers attending that school and that as much as it is important(ish) to give kids a chance to play other sports, there should be a proper strategy within the school which helps develop those pupils in the disciplines that they are committed to outside of school (i.e GAA sports). Clubs have developed these youngsters to a fairly decent level but from what I see (and from past experience), schools (bar the exceptions mentioned) at best simply utilise the talent that is there rather than play any serious role in developing that talent. It would be great to see schools in the Ballymena Coleraine and Antrim areas in particular play a much stronger role in kids physical and technical development. Progress is being made as there are coaches coming into schools but I don't see much strategy being promoted so that we all can see what is being done and what is needed over and above.

[Minder]

Johhneycool, how do you think wee Dinger will do with us this year? I think he took Glenravel last year and they were pretty impressed with him, mind you the problem was they just didn't give a fcuk.

[Sleeping giant]

Yeeeeehooooooo.   Welcome back nag  ;DNet down over there as past while?

[Tony Baloney]

Conversations should be taking place between county boards and schools on a regular basis. The argument needs to be made that they have a sizeable number of hurlers and/or footballers attending that school and that as much as it is important(ish) to give kids a chance to play other sports, there should be a proper strategy within the school which helps develop those pupils in the disciplines that they are committed to outside of school (i.e GAA sports). Clubs have developed these youngsters to a fairly decent level but from what I see (and from past experience), schools (bar the exceptions mentioned) at best simply utilise the talent that is there rather than play any serious role in developing that talent. It would be great to see schools in the Ballymena Coleraine and Antrim areas in particular play a much stronger role in kids physical and technical development. Progress is being made as there are coaches coming into schools but I don't see much strategy being promoted so that we all can see what is being done and what is needed over and above.

St. Louis in Ballymena must pick up some reasonable players but they never seem to make the breakthrough. They have always had decent soccer teams and I know are investing significantly in handball in the school.

[Milltown Row2]

Looking back to primary school days we had the Christian Brothers looking after us in regards of training and playing Gaelic games. Now depending on what Christian Brothers school you went to and who taught in that school decided on the code you were best at.

We had a great Brother (Our club president) who looked after the football side of things, was relentless and was basically my first introduction into Gaelic Games, the hurling side of things was picked up by the local club, Davitts, which to their credit was great, they used their club minibus to run us to the pitches and coached us also.

Primary schools don't have the time, staff or even the local club to help them out. If we could engage the kids at the P4 age up then we would have the interest and numbers joining the local clubs.

As for secondary schools, if we didn't in my old school have a Johnnies man looking after our team we wouldn't have had any hurling. We were very competitive and managed a few Ulster schools finals over the years.

Money should be thrown at the primary schools first, work from the ground up

[clootfromthe21]

Saw that Ulster Colleges (2 14) beat Dublin Colleges (1 13) in a challenge today. Seems promising?

[btdtgtt]

Wouldn't read too much into that result cloot. The fullness of time will see how the colleges side perform against fuller opposition.

Lads it sounds good in theory but shifting the "blame" on to schools is way off the mark. Some points;

- we lose focus on hurling straight away at primary schools so take second level out of the equation straight away. It's long gone by the time youngsters arrive there.

- in the south "community" schools have a sporting (hurling) role to play in the community. Time & resources are allocated. This is simply not the case here - teachers are stuck in schooling beurocracy and are openly discouraged from pushing sport & hurling. Again - time & resources. 

- clubs tried to fill this void by going into schools but child protection and the fact that club coaches may be working during school hours prevents this so often. Not to mention over protective & health safety parents. Faced with this schools hands are tied.

- so can the county & ulster colleges & cummann na bunscoileanna help? Again there is simple not the resources there. Either in terms of money or existing equipment. And for what it's worth the standard of coaching put into schools by paid officials in this county is a downright disgrace.

- also schools hurling in ulster suffers across all facets by being treated as a 2nd class sport at best. Ulster colleges only interest is mccrory cup - lip service is paid to hurling.

So faced with all this lads I feel it is lazy or ill-informed to suggest the crux of the problem lies in schools. A complete sea change in infrastructure and legalities and resources would need to occur for schools to be a meaningful force for hurling development in this part of the world.

One side note - I hope this post is not taken the wrong way by the many dedicated people who put tireless hours into hurling in schools for no reward whatsoever. They fight the good fight against all odds.

[saffron89]

yeah primary school vital

it comes as no surprise that St Pats maghera and CBS are around 3 times the size of C P and the Garron tower

another big problem is numbers in school of male staff, its a female dominated industry

was talking to a teacher in one of the above schools overs new year there and he claimed time is becoming harder and harder to get lads out of class

[johnneycool]

Johhneycool, how do you think wee Dinger will do with us this year? I think he took Glenravel last year and they were pretty impressed with him, mind you the problem was they just didn't give a fcuk.

ding can be a thran wee bollox but he's a schrewd enough operator . Heard the other night he was taking  you.

[Minder]

Johhneycool, how do you think wee Dinger will do with us this year? I think he took Glenravel last year and they were pretty impressed with him, mind you the problem was they just didn't give a fcuk.

ding can be a thran wee bollox but he's a schrewd enough operator . Heard the other night he was taking  you.

Someone from outside the club is what we need I think.

[NAG1]

Yeeeeehooooooo.   Welcome back nag  ;DNet down over there as past while?

Net was grand what's up?