Rebel Og awards a booming success

The great and the good of Cork underage GAA will gather tonight for the inaugural annual Rebel Óg Awards dinner at the Rochestown Park Hotel.

“It has been tremendously successful,” Rebel Óg chairman Marc Sheehan said.

“We began the monthly awards scheme around this time last year, in late January 2012, and the response has been absolutely phenomenal.

“There will hopefully be a big crowd there for the awards, we have 14 monthly recipients and they deserve to be congratulated.”

Sheehan is not surprised at the way the awards have grown in popularity in such a short space of time.

“I think that those of us who wanted to initiate the scheme knew there was great potential there,” he said.

“In a county the size of Cork, where you have so many primary and post-primary schools and obviously a large number of clubs, it’s important to recognise underage achievement in such a way.

“We strongly suspected that the awards would be well received and that’s what has been proven, they broaden out the sense of achievement across a local area and are a source of pride for those involved.

“There has also been great exposure given to the awards and for that, we must thank our sponsors, the Irish Examiner, RedFM, Cummins Sports and the Rochestown Park Hotel for their promotion of the scheme.”

Having been run on a trial basis in 2011 and 2012, Rebel Óg gained official permanent status at the Cork County Board convention in December, and Sheehan acknowledges this as a further step in its progress, as well as allowing a focus on objectives for 2013.

“We have launched an integrated fixtures plan and there is a lot of back-of-house work going on at the moment to ensure that everything runs smoothly with regard to that.

“As well, there is a programme laid down for the running of our development squads, under the direction of Brian Cuthbert and Kevin O’Donovan, and the feedback has been very positive.

“There are over 400 players involved and you need a very structured approach, it’s multi-faceted in that you work on skills and physical development, injury prevention, diet and so on. The teams have great facilities at UCC and CIT and the response has been excellent, so bringing that over the line and establishing it on a firm basis is the aim.”