The football gospel according to John
For the past week the West County Hotel in Ennis has been base camp for John Delaney and his army of support staff on their magical tour around Clare, with John Aldridge and Ray Houghton also on board, charming a county that all week has charmed them in return. This is how it has been since Delaney took over as chief executive seven years ago. The old-style AGM, as he puts it himself, “might have been over a rule change in the Citywest on a Saturday”, reinforcing the image of an out-of-touch, Dublin-dominated association that would squabble over the placement of a comma. Now pedantic rule changes are dealt with at low-key EGMs; AGMs are an opportunity to reach out to the regions and have a week-long celebration of the game. Counties bid to host the event. In recent years the roadshow has rolled into Kerry, Mayo, Monaghan and last year, Wexford. Donegal, Wicklow and Westmeath are lined up to stage the next three. Just as the game has spread, the association has reached out as well.
Delaney knows how tough and isolated it can feel, championing the garrison game outside the garrison towns. Although he was born in Waterford 42 years ago, he grew up in Tipperary town and attended the local Abbey CBS where the only game of soccer they played was on Delaney’s last day in the school. “We’d just finished our Leaving,” he says, “and I insisted we play a soccer game on the front pitch that last day. I told them they couldn’t stop us because it was our last day there anyway.”
