Delegates vote to postpone decision on leagues

A MAJORITY of club delegates voted to postpone a vote on a proposal to revamp the Mayo GAA Senior Leagues for next year at a meeting of the County Board on Wednesday night.
It had been expected that delegates would vote to rubber-stamp a proposal put forward by Mayo GAA's CCC, following discussions with club representatives at a number of previous meetings, that would see 20 teams (made up of two groups of ten teams) playing Division 1 league football in 2024.
However, after a lengthy discussion, most delegates in the room voted to postpone any decision until next month — by which time they hope to have debated the proposal with their club executives.
Kiltimagh delegate Seamus Corry cautioned against a vote being taken on the proposal being put forward on a number of grounds, including his own club’s current situation.
Kiltimagh were relegated from Division 1 this season and lost all three of their Intermediate championship group games after a mass exodus of players from their squad.
“We find ourselves, as most clubs know, in a very difficult situation this year,” said Corry.
“We’re not looking for sympathy here, by any manner or means, lots of clubs might find themselves in a similar situation. But we find ourselves in a situation where we got hammered in every game in Division 1 this year and we also got beaten pretty heavily in our championship matches.
“We now find ourselves, under this proposal, going to be playing Division 1 football again next year. It makes a mockery of the 2023 league in so far as that the teams that didn’t perform, and weren’t competitive like our own club, and got deservedly relegated, are now going to be back again playing in Division 1 and will not be competitive..
And I’ll probably be here this time next year saying to ye why we’re not able to fulfil fixtures.
“We agree with the idea of ten teams [in each section], nine games makes perfect sense and we support that. But it’s how you get there,” he added.
“You don’t get there by bringing up four teams from Division 2 straight away and leaving the two teams that got relegated [in Division 1]. It means that we may as well not have played the 2023 league.
“I don’t know what the big rush is with this. I understand it’s been out there, but I’m not sure that everybody understands fully what we’re doing.
“With this we’re going to have 20 teams in Division 1, I remember one time when division one was a league that everybody aspired to get up to.
“I would urge delegates, there’s no rush with this. Let’s make sure that we know what we’re voting for here because it will destroy some of the smaller clubs here, like mine.
“I wonder do people actually realise what we’re voting for?”
Central Council delegate Paddy McNicholas also spoke on the issue.
“We gave a commitment to clubs at the start of the year in relation to promotion/relegation and we should stand by it. Or else clubs won’t trust us again.”
It also became apparent that some delegates were unsure about the finer details of the proposal that was to be voted on, despite the fact that a breakdown of the format had been circulated to clubs on August 11 last.
“This should have been debated and discussed by clubs,” said South Mayo Board chairman, Donal Walsh. “I think a decision should be made and we move on.”
Walsh’s proposal to have a vote on the night faced a counter-proposal from Connacht GAA delegate, Paul Cunnane, who also spoke on the subject. After a show of hands, the decision was taken to postpone a vote until next month’s meeting.
“It’s very disappointing from a CCC point of view,” remarked Mayo GAA secretary, Ronan Kirrane. “It’s clear that the proposal wasn’t discussed at a lot of clubs.”