THE Antrim County Board are about to implement a short-term plan to fill the empty Gaelfast regeneration director role by appointing Jimmy Darragh from Ulster GAA to run the programme until they can appoint someone in a full-time capacity.

The position of Gaelfast Regeneration director was held by Paul Donnelly from summer 2019 to the start of January of this year. He chose to leave the post to take up a job working for Ulster University.

The Antrim executive want to fill the position but the GAA have stopped all recruitment at the moment, due to the coronavirus pandemic, so that means no one can take over in a full-time capacity from Donnelly. After discussions with Croke Park, they have agreed to fill the gap by seconding Jimmy Darragh from Ulster GAA to take over the Gaelfast role until such times that they can go through a proper appointment process.

Darragh was working as Provincial Hurling Development manager in the provincial body. He had already worked on the Gaelfast project with Paul Donnelly so he will be in a good place to take the project forward.