December diary at breaking point for Dr Crokes

It’s almost as if Dr Crokes are being punished for their latest club championship run, a dysfunctional fixtures programme meaning there is the very strong possibility they’ll be playing football during the opening three weekends of December and, potentially, a further two games over the Christmas period.

The worrying reality is that win or lose Sunday’s Munster final against Miltown-Malbay at the Gaelic Grounds, the Crokes are facing into one of their busiest months of the year.

It’s a similar story for a handful of neighbouring clubs, given the 2018 East Kerry football championship is set to spill into 2019.

This, and countless other examples over the years, has prompted a Roscommon motion, to be debated by Central Council this weekend, which proposes the establishment of “a select committee to conduct an overall review of the National Games Programme”.

The Club Players’ Association is now firmly behind the Roscommon motion, calling for a “blank-canvass” approach to the GAA’s games calendar.

On the first weekend of next month, Dr Crokes and Kerins O’Rahilly’s contest the county league final. On Sunday, December 9, it is Crokes versus Fossa in the first round of the East Kerry championship (O’Donoghue Cup). The reward for the winner is a quarter-final tie against Gneeveguilla on December 15/16. It has yet to be decided if the subsequent semi-final will be scheduled for two or three days before Christmas or the weekend of December 28/29. This is all weather permitting, of course. A spell of heavy rainfall could send the final back into mid-January.

Rathmore, courtesy of a quarter-final win over Spa on November 9, have already booked their place in the O’Donoghue Cup penultimate round. That they have to wait a minimum of five weeks to play their respective semi-final was recently described as “madness” by Kerry’s Paul Murphy.

Won our East Kerry quarter-final on Friday [November 9], our first match in eight weeks. Despite the intercounty year finishing on August 4, one of the semi-finals might not be played before 16th or 23rd December. Plenty of available dates weren’t used. Madness,” he tweeted.

Dr Crokes selector Niall O’Callaghan echoes Murphy’s sentiments.

“If you progress in this East Kerry championship, you’ll more than likely be playing football into the New Year, which is tough on a lot of clubs,” O’Callaghan remarked.

“Fossa finished their county league on the third weekend of August. Seamus Moynihan is training them since the third weekend of August until the second weekend of December for one game. Gneeveguilla are waiting too.

“I would agree with Paul Murphy’s stance. Because of all this, he has no break in terms of going straight back in with Kerry. That’s not right.”

East Kerry’s run to the semi-final stage of the county championship saw the divisional board temporarily stall the O’Donoghue Cup but were clubs willing to line out without their county players, this competition could have been run off during the summer.

The East Kerry board handle their business very well in terms of the competitions they run at all levels, but everyone wants their best players for the O’Donoghue Cup. Maybe, you have to give direction and say, these are when the games are on and if you don’t have your Kerry players, you don’t have them. Players do deserve a break.

With Crokes bidding to secure their fifth provincial title this decade, the players are well accustomed to the two-and-a-half-month break between the Munster final and All-Ireland semi. O’Callaghan would prefer if the club season was finished in the calendar year.

“Whoever wins this Sunday has to train for nearly 12 weeks. For one game. Three weeks after we played the All-Ireland club final in 2017, we were playing a club championship game here in Kerry. You can’t give fellas a break.

“I would totally be in favour of finishing it in the year. At least, then, the players can get a break. We need to create a system where fellas can get six to eight weeks total shutdown and get their bodies right to go again.”