Kennedy confident Páirc will be ready for championship

Cork County Board chairperson Tracey Kennedy is confident the playing surface at the revamped Páirc Uí Chaoimh will be ready for the rigours of the championship.

And she revealed it had been tested ahead of the weekend double-header.

While attending the official launch of the 2019 Rochestown Park Hotel-sponsored Kelleher Shield, Kennedy acknowledged that the playing surface was not good enough.

In a statement released yesterday evening, the Cork County Board revealed that in future, decisions on the suitability of Páirc Uí Chaoimh to hold games will be taken on the Monday before such occasions.

But many will wonder why such a decision didn’t happen before last weekend’s double-header?

“We did check out the pitch during the week and we had it inspected a number of times and we did hope that it would be able to hold up on Sunday.

"Obviously, testing it isn’t the same as testing it under competitive circumstances, and it proved the problem that was there at this particular stage last year was still there.

“While we thought we had taken every precaution possible, unfortunately, yesterday was disappointing for us all.

"But we can just hope now that as time goes on, the weather will improve, growth will improve because these are the things that are causing the greatest issues at the moment.

"We hope by looking at it by a week-by-week basis that we’ll be able to keep it safe and in the best possible condition.”

The controversy about the pitch in the Páirc, coupled with the financial problems surrounding the entire project, also raised the issue of who actually will be in charge of improving the playing facilities and what type of pitch will be installed on a site that isn’t blessed by much natural light in the winter months.

“It’s a matter for the board of the stadium, obviously the county board has representatives on the stadium board; the chairperson, secretary, and treasurer are directors of the company, but it’s the responsibility of the stadium board,” said Kennedy.

“We’ve brought in the Sports Turf Research Institute, who are experts in these matters, and we have a couple of reports from them but a final decision in relation to the actual composition of any pitch has yet to be taken but there’s a stadium board meeting coming up and I presume it will be taken there.”

With Cork’s next Allianz NHL game against Clare on February 16 now moved to Páirc Uí Rinn, supporters may begin to wonder as to whether Cork’s championship games may be also destined for a change in venue. Kennedy does not think so.

“As the statement indicated today, we fully expect that by May the grass will be growing and that everything will be fine.

"It’s a similar issue to what was there last year, and we expect that it will be fine by then but, obviously, weather conditions dictate everything, but if we have normal conditions, we expect that we will be playing our championship games in Páirc Uí Chaoimh.”