Time for West Clare clubs to amalgamate?

ST Joseph’s Doora-Barefield’s stunning defeat of county champions Doonbeg has underlined the changing demographics of Clare football. Couple this with Cratloe’s advancement to the semi-final and the fact that Wolfe Tones should really have beaten Kilkee and there is clear evidence that West Clare’s football power base is eroding rapidly.
It is a common belief in the west that this development is not good for Clare football. The fact that many Cratloe, Doora-Barefield and Wolfe Tones footballers are dual players is held as evidence against them. The view is that these players will opt to play hurling, rather than football, for Clare if they have a choice to make.
However, before anybody in West Clare suggests that the rise of East and Mid-Clare football is bad for the game in the county, they should examine why many players from their own areas don’t represent the county. If some of the top footballers in West Clare can’t be bothered playing for Clare, why should it be highlighted if footballers from dual clubs opt to play hurling and not football for the county?
That argument aside, population trends has much to do with the apparent demise of football in West Clare. Many of the best players in most West Clare club teams, including Kilkee, Doonbeg, Kilrush and Cooraclare, are closer to 40 than they are to 20. Clubs are simply not producing sufficient numbers of young footballers to be able to allow their older veterans to move on before the last ounce is dredged from them.
Aside from Kilmurry Ibrickane and the odd individual in a range of other clubs, the best young players in the county currently represent Cratloe, Wolfe Tones and Doora-Barefield.
Podge Collins, Cathal McInerney, Conor McGrath (Cratloe); Gary Leahy, William Flynn, Craig O’Brien (Wolfe Tones); Enda Lyons, Stephen Collins and Alan O’Neill (Doora-Barefield) are just a handful of the talented young footballers lining out for those clubs.
Very soon several West Clare clubs are going to have to take brave decisions and amalgamate with their neighbours and possibly form entirely now clubs. Even though Kilkee may well win Sunday’s quarter-final replay against Wolfe Tones and qualify for the semi-final, the club might have to link up permanently with O’Curry’s and Naomh Eoin in the next three or four years. Most of Kilkee’s leading players are over 30 and it will be very difficult for them to be competitive at senior level in five years.
The aforementioned amalgamation would give players from Kilbaha to Kilkee the chance to play senior football and therefore help to improve the game in West Clare.
Shannon Gaels and Killimer linked up four years ago and other clubs may have to consider a similar course of action if the standard of the game in West Clare is to avoid dipping further.
However, for now the focus is on Cratloe and Doora-Barefield, who have added real excitement to this year’s championship. Given that St Joseph’s were virtually gone before their defeat of Shannon Gaels, their transformation is particularly remarkable. Of course, elements in that club and indeed in Cratloe and Wolfe Tones might feel that the rise of football in those clubs might derail their hurling ambitions. One would never think that hurling and football belong to the same organisation.