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Kerins O’Rahilly’s manager, Barry O’Shea.
KERINS O’RAHILLY’S manager, Barry O’Shea, is highly critical of the decision to relegate three teams from this year’s senior county championship.
Speaking to TraleeToday.ie prior to the Strand Road club’s opening round of the championship against Rathmore on Saturday, he said the new system will “demoralise the clubs which are the lifeblood of the association”.
“I know it was probably done with the best of intentions, but I think it’s a disgraceful system. I think any club side should be disgusted with it,” said the former Kerry star.
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Unlike previous years, senior status won’t be determined by clubs’ run in the competition, but by the new system that could potentially send some big guns down to intermediate level.
Relegation will be decided between nine club sides in three unseeded groups decided by an open draw, with the bottom club in each group losing senior status.
So potentially a ‘group of death’ featuring, O’Rahilly’s, Austin Stacks and Legion could be on the cards.
The decision to review the county championship came before last year’s competition, when it was felt the standard of the competition along with Kerry football was in decline.
Barry O’Shea is none too pleased with the system which he sees as extremely harsh on senior club teams.
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“There are many divisional teams that put absolutely no effort into the county championship, yet they are not getting any sanctions and they’ll be there forever. I can’t see how getting rid of teams out of the county championship will improve it. There will always be poor teams and poor games no matter what system,” he said.
“I think it was a bit of an knee-jerk reaction, to drop three teams in one year. It’s just not a sensible move as far as I can see,” said O’Shea.
“When South Kerry were dominating the county championship, there was all this talk that the divisional teams were too strong. Then it swings around with Dr Crokes being the best team in the county so they want to make the divisional teams stronger.”
“There is no system that can make these teams good or bad, these things go in cycles. Creating a different system will not create better players,” he said
The two finalists of the senior club championship this year, Dingle and Dr Crokes, are exempt from the relegation groups.
The nine senior club sides going into the hat are: Kerins O’Rahilly’s, Austin Stacks, Ardfert, Kilcummin, Rathmore, Legion, Laune Rangers, St Michael’s Foilmore, Milltown/Castlemaine.
“The county board are killing the senior clubs with this. The intermediate and junior grades are becoming stronger since the club All-Ireland championships were brought in in those competitions.”
“The reason why the county championship is being affected is because club players are not feeding into the divisional sides [in their area] so those teams become weaker, which makes the competition weaker. I just don’t see how dropping three clubs out of the championship can fix that.”
“They say the idea of the divisional teams is to allow players from smaller clubs to be seen playing in the senior championship, but that doesn’t make players better or unearth players for the Kerry senior team. We’re in the age of technology with twitter and mobile phones that any good player that’s in the county is known from the age of 12 or 13,” he said.
The issue of where and when these relegation matches can be played could prove a headache for clubs in an already jam-packed schedule.
“If Kerry have a successful year, which we all hope they do, how are they going to fit in all these fixtures? Are we going to be playing for relegation in January and February? There will be no games played in July, August and September so we could be playing the relegation matches in winter,” said O’Shea.
“Weakening the senior clubs is going to weaken Kerry football. I think the system that is proposed is just doing its best to absolutely demoralise the clubs which are the lifeblood of the association. If we’re going to start putting senior clubs down, it’s going to have a knock-on effect long term,” he said.
Kerins O’Rahilly’s take on Rathmore, in the second game of a double header in Austin Stack Park, Saturday, throw in 7pm.
