Finals played in deplorable conditions

A MOTION from Ruan asking that the senior and intermediate hurling and football championship finals be played in a pitch that is enclosed and with covered accommodation, was accepted as a recommendation.
Proposing the motion, Ger Lyons said, “The finals this year were held in deplorable conditions. There was a lot of anger expressed at a meeting of our club, arising from the late notification of the change of venue for the intermediate final. Many of the supporters didn’t hear about it until 12 noon on the day of the final. People got soaked in Clarecastle, which wasn’t Clarecastle’s fault. Many could not see the game due to umbrellas and they were in no fit state to go to the senior final afterwards as they were drenched. There was a stewarding problem that day and many were allowed onto the far side causing health and safety problems. With the way the weather was this year, perhaps the senior and intermediate finals should not have been played. Clearly, numbers were down and it was a travesty for club players and no way could they have given of their best,” he said.
Chairman Michael O’Neill said at 10am on that morning, both games could have been played at Cusack Park. When the decision was made, we notified clubs. We had no choice but to play the games on the day. Nobody envisaged that it would stay raining as long as it did. We don’t get the most kind weather at times and that was one occasion,” he said.
Saying he was glad that Ruan aren’t blaming Clarecastle for losing the final, Clarecastle delegate Bernard Hanrahan said he had three scenarios. “If the championship is played as Michael O’Halloran suggested in August, they can be played in Cusack Park, no problem in the world. Secondly, we didn’t get notification until Sunday morning and we were involved in a Senior B Championship with Newmarket in Clareabbey so we couldn’t provide stewarding at that particular time. The other scenario would be that if we had got the €25,000 last year, we would have an enclosed pitch and a stand. Be that as it may, our pitch is always available to the county board,” he said to applause.
“The facilities in Clarecastle are excellent and without them, we would have found it very difficult not alone to play the intermediate final but to play a lot of games during the year. There was no way we could make the decision on Saturday as we wanted to give the opportunity to play both finals in Cusack Park. The county executive do not have the power to call off the game and, I suppose, in a way it’s no harm we don’t have that authority,” secretary Pat Fitzgerald said.