Players seek Munster seeding reversal

The county boards of Clare, Limerick, Tipperary and Waterford are to be asked to seek an emergency meeting of the Munster Council with a view to reversing the decision to re-introduce seeding in the province’s senior football championship.

Following last week’s Munster Council meeting to keep Cork and Kerry on separate sides of next month’s draw, representatives from the other four counties met in Tipperary town last night, with the mood overwhelmingly in favour of seeking a reversal.

“The general view from the players’ reps at the meeting was that we were unhappy with the decision,” said Stephen Kelly of Limerick.

“What we have come up with is that we have drafted letters to each county board asking them to request an emergency meeting of the Munster Council to discuss the overturning of the decision.”

The proposal to seek a turnaround among players in the four counties was unanimous, according to Kelly.

“I’d say that it’s 110%,” he said when asked of the level of opposition. “It’s fairly adamant, every one of the players would be against it.”

The players had also been in contact with the Gaelic Players’ Association (GPA), though Kelly was keen to point out things are at a very early stage.

“We would be discussing things with them further on down the line,” he said, “depending on the course of action that needs to be taken.

“As it stands, this was just an informal meeting between ourselves. We felt that we needed to sit down and get a feeling from the four counties of where we were at. This is what we’ve come up with and we’ll see where it takes us.”

The GPA’s communications officer Seán Potts stated earlier yesterday that the association’s services would be available to the players if and when they were required.

“I know [GPA development officer] Tomás Colton has been in contact with those counties and is working with them behind the scenes to see exactly what they want to do and how they are going to protest about the situation,” said Potts.

“Obviously we understand their concerns and we want to see what way they want to articulate their concerns so we are working behind the scenes with them. The players have been onto Tomás, but I believe the county boards aren’t happy either. It is almost a combined protest.”

Meanwhile, the new Cork senior football manager will be selected by a six-person committee, comprising three members of the county executive and three representatives of the county board.

At last night’s board meeting in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, Der O’Regan (Douglas), county junior football manager Paul McCarthy (Kinsale) and Frank Long (Douglas) were nominated to represent the board on the committee.

Christy Ring (Glen Rovers), Michael O’Brien (Aghada) and Seán McAuliffe (Kilbrin) were appointed to the committee to find an U21 hurling manager, which will also have three executive members. The new minor hurling manager will be picked by a six-person committee too, three from the executive and two from the board — Frank McCarthy (Ballincollig) and Pat Horgan (Midleton) — with Coiste na nÓg to also put forward a member.

Ryan said he was “overly concerned regarding the campaigning going on” for some management positions and pleaded with the board to do what they did for the “betterment of Cork GAA and its teams, rather than the personal betterment of anybody.”

McCarthy, who led Cork to the All-Ireland junior football title last month, was unanimously re-appointed, while Liam Hayes will continue as the manager of the intermediate hurling side.