Dooley calls for return to 12-team top tier
Clare counterpart Mike McNamara ignited the debate Sunday when, after his side’s defeat to Dublin which confirmed relegation, he claimed the Banner would boycott Division Two where he said Offaly and Wexford were playing “meaningless” matches.
Antrim chairman John McSparran was understandably aggrieved by that remark given his county’s defeat of Wexford early last month.
The Ulster county meet Offaly in the last round on Sunday week with the prize another shot against Wexford in the final and play-off and to Division One next year.
“I thought the structure we had last year was good,” said Dooley. “If you look at Division One at the moment there is a round of league games coming up and they are all meaningless because the finalists and relegation has been decided. There is something wrong there.
“You would like to be getting tougher games but we have a tough game on Sunday week against Antrim and, if we can get over that, we have Wexford (in the final).
“We’ve played a lot of games but they wouldn’t have been the toughest, no disrespect to the teams we have played.”
Dooley’s hypothesis is supported by an average winning margin of 15 points against Westmeath, Kerry, Carlow, Down and Laois prior to their unexpected 12-point loss to Wexford last week, but GAA president Nickey Brennan begged to differ.
He said: “As regards a team not playing in Division Two, that is a lot of nonsense. If you are good enough you will stay in Division One, if you are not good enough you will go down to Division Two and try fight your way up again.
“I wouldn’t be comfortable with (McNamara’s) comments and I think it is unfair to the teams that have made Division Two quite a competitive league. The finalists won’t be known until the last round of games.”
Defeat Antrim, in what is a virtual semi-final on April 19, and Offaly set up a schedule where they meet Wexford three times in eight weeks with the last of those meetings a Leinster Championship encounter at the end of May.
Kilkenny’s pre-eminence, inside and outside the province, threaten to overshadow everyone else’s efforts in Leinster yet again this year but Dooley believes his side is showing signs of progress despite last week’s reversal.
“It’s early days yet. We have been able to play with a settled team with Birr not being involved in the club setup. That has been a help. We’ve had a few injuries as well and we would have liked to have got tougher games in the league but we’ll find out more about ourselves.
“The first competition we play in the championship is the Leinster championship and we’ll be going all out to do our best. If that doesn’t work out we’ll take it from there and reassess where were going then.”
As for those injuries, Diarmuid Horan is recovering from a recent hop operation, David Kenny and Brendan Murphy are on the way back from hamstring and knee concerns while David Franks went for a scan yesterday. Dooley is hopeful that all four will be fit in time for the championship.
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