Conway: We had to redesign crest

KERRY County Board chairman Jerome Conway accepted they had no choice but to redesign their traditional coat of arms, given the current economic climate.

“Unfortunately we did not own our crest and therefore could not register it and that enables individuals and companies to use it without recourse to the county board,” he said.

“I suppose from a commercial point of view, there will be some monies for the board to be made, particularly around All-Ireland time. I don’t have an estimate on how much it will generate, but as the time goes on, it could be quite substantial, as we will have our own shop in the proposed new Kerry GAA museum in Killarney.”

Conway felt Kerry and other counties will have to be more prudent when it comes to balancing their books in future but does not foresee having to deal with a deficit as big as the Mayo County Board are faced with this year.

“In fairness to Mayo, most of their debt is due to the development of MacHale Park which was done when times were good and they were expecting outside help financially and unfortunately, those things are not available to them now.

“We are planning a Centre of Excellence in Currans and we are working hand in hand with Croke Park. There is a debt in the Fitzgerald Stadium and until we satisfy them that we could service that debt, they were slow in granting us the money. Now that the scheme at the stadium has been well supported, I can see that grants will be forthcoming for Currans and that should be happening in 2012.”

Already the players and management have accepted the need for reduced expenditure this year.

“They have all bought into to the idea that if you spend with one hand, you got to claw it back with the other.

“For example, this year it was agreed between management, players and us that the team holiday would be shorter, so the squad are off to New York for five days before Christmas, instead of a longer holiday in January.”