Cooney reluctant to fence supporters in

GAA president Christy Cooney has reaffirmed the Association’s reluctance to introduce fencing in a bid to prevent incidents like those witnessed in Portlaoise on Sunday when fans entered the pitch and contributed to a melee.

The GAA has managed to combat the invasion of spectators onto the Croke Park pitch after big games with the installation of a perspex fence on Hill 16 but Cooney is not an advocate of repeating that in the county grounds.

“You know our views on that,” he stated. “We don’t necessarily want to hem people in. We’ve put on a pilot (scheme) in Croke Park over the last two years and it worked extremely well. There was nobody coming in from the stands in any of our games. We want that (attitude) to operate in every county ground and every club ground and for people to respect the players in particular because by coming onto the pitch, they are causing problems for players.