Nominations sought for football boss

Clare GAA has decided to seek nominations for the position of county senior football manager for 2012.
Holder of the post for the past two years, Micheál McDermott confirmed to this week’s special board meeting that he is available to continue for another term and this has led to speculation that he will be the only candidate when nominations close next Wednesday.
Miltown delegate Noel Walsh proposed at this week’s meeting that the same selection process as applied for the hurling post should apply now and clubs should be asked to nominate.
The proposal was seconded by Clondegad’s Seamus O’Reilly, who went on to ask “the local media to note that his club were of the opinion there is a need for change”.
Doonbeg’s Michael Neenan asked the meeting “to go deeper with regard to who is put in place. Put in place a director of football and start from the ground up. Take a leaf from the book of Tipperary in football and Dublin in hurling. We have to take it seriously. West Clare is now losing out and we need proper coaching and a good hand up. The best players are not training and don’t want to play for the county.
“The hurlers are streets ahead of us and we haven’t a hell’s chance of getting to that level. Unless we put a director of football in place, we are fooling ourselves”.
Neenan’s claim that there is more coaching and more money being spent on the hurling side of things and there are better structures in place for hurlers, drew a response from the county coaching officer, Eamonn Fennessy.
“The coaching and games committee is not ignoring football.
“We are meeting five or six nights a week looking at structures,” he said. Board treasurer Bernard Keane said there is as much money spent on football as there is on hurling.