back again…another club season begins in Donegal

This topic has been spoken about at length over the last few years but we have seen very little, if any, great moves to deal with it.

Club players know and understand that county football is extremely important and they all want to see their own county do well, but they also want to be able to play the sport they love at a sensible time of the year.

Without sounding too condescending to the powers that be, I would like to point out that without club football their would be no county team so to punish them in the way that they have been is some slap in the face.

My own club are down to play next weekend which will be followed by a second game on Easter Monday, after that your guess is as good as mine as to when we’ll next play.

The county board will lay out a schedule of fixtures which will include a number of star games. The problem is that the schedule tends to change as often as the Donegal weather which, in turn, irritates the players and clubs.

Let’s just say Donegal make the League semi-final, club games will either be put off or teams will be told to play without their county players, which usually results in all teams refusing to play the games.

All of this happens before we even reach the proper action of the Ulster Championship and All Ireland series, during those competitions you may as well pack up and return to training in September to avoid disappointment and players becoming disillusioned.

Our first club championship game is fixed for mid May after which the competition will be shelved until Donegal are out of the Championship. This schedule means that club players must sit twiddling their thumbs for the whole summer. I like a lot of club players headed to America last summer to play a bit of ball. I was in Chicago for seven weeks and I only missed one league game, now no matter how you look at that it’s just wrong and it’s totally disrespectful to our club players.

I have said here before that county players shoulder a lot of this blame for allowing this to happen. By going along with what county managers ask of them they are letting down the players whom they first kicked a ball with.

One free week before the Championship is plenty and if a few players start to demand to play for their clubs then things will have to change.

Likewise clubs must become stronger and stand together more. If the county board threaten to fine clubs and take points off them for not fielding without their county players then clubs should unite together and refuse to play any games and also threaten to withdraw their players from representing the county.

Some of you might think that this is a bit radical but sure isn’t that exactly what county managers are doing for years by refusing to let their players represent their own clubs?

This would cause mayhem but it couldn’t be anymore chaotic than what we have at present and at least both sides might then realise that they must work together rather than against each other and ultimately it would result in a more favourable schedule for club players.

It is not an isolated incident because it happens in all counties so if congress refused to do anything about it a few weeks back then in my opinion it’s up to the players and clubs to make the move themselves.

Hopefully in a few months time I will be praising the efforts of the county board and recognising the changes they have made to balance things but somehow I just can’t see it.