O’Connell hits out at board’s handling of Clare crisis

CLARE hurling captain Brian O’Connell has launched a withering attack of his county board for their failure to resolve a dispute between the players and manager Mike McNamara.

Last month players voted overwhelmingly against McNamara and his management team remaining in place for the 2010 campaign.

Banner GAA chiefs aimed to get the concerned parties around the negotiating table in an effort to thrash out their differences but O’Connell claims the board have cancelled three meetings between the squad and McNamara in the past fortnight without ‘any real reason.’

O’Connell said: “The public perception is out there that we are stopping these meetings with the county board.

“We have not cancelled anything. There have been three different meetings cancelled, meetings when we have always been available,” O’Connell told The Clare People.

O’Connell said the county board’s actions are infuriating the players.

“It’s putting lads out – there are lads coming from Galway, from Limerick, from Waterford and Dublin, but the meetings have been cancelled at short notice and treated half-heartedly by the board, while the perception out there is that we’re not willing to meet. It’s the total opposite.

“On Sunday, I was playing soccer for Bunratty and then afterwards I had a text on my phone around five o’clock that the meeting was cancelled. I had to go around then and try to contact over 30 lads, who had cancelled any plans they had for the evening to attend the meeting.

“It’s been dragging on and on – we want this out of the way and sorted so we can move on. That’s the bottom line – another week is going to pass now and next thing there could be another week passed and next thing it could be Christmas and you’ll then be starting in January.

“It’s being put off and put off and put off – we haven’t been given any real reason.

“The more the board are putting off meetings, the more we are questions are there as to why they are putting off meetings. Have they got something else up their sleeves? What’s going on with the board?”

However Clare chairman Michael O’Neill last night admitted there had been some problems in arranging meetings but said the board had held face to face meetings with the players. O’Neill said: “There have been some problems but I am not going to disclose to you what they are but we have had some meetings with the players.”

However he insisted that a resolution will be found before Christmas.

“It’s taking longer to resolve than we had envisaged. I can’t say when it is going to be resolved for certain but it will be inside the next week or two. Our county convention takes place on December 17th and we want it sorted by then.”