Garrett Noonan says Billy Lee’s experience key for Limerick Minor footballers in 2026

GARRETT NOONAN will enter his first year in charge of the Limerick minor footballers in 2026.Noonan has assembled an impressive backrooom team which includes former Limerick senior football manager Billy Lee, former Limerick footballer Muiris Gavin, Niall McDermott (Monaleen), Paul Longeran (Ballylanders), Aaron O'Sullivan (Pallasgreen) and Eoin Ryan (Adare).

Noonan felt it was important to be able to lean on Billy Lee's experience of inter-county management.

“Billy (Lee) has been absolutely brilliant, he's brilliant as a coach. His depth of knowledge and experience of the game is incredible. One of things that I learned from him was the way he can deal with people. Billy is excellent at dealing with players, with how he gets his message across. The players are really buying in to what he is trying to do.”

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Noonan delivered outstanding service for the Limerick senior footballers, representing the Shannonsiders across fifteen seasons from 2006 to 2021.

The Dromcollogher-Broadford clubman was never one to seek the headlines, but he played many roles during some challenging years for Limerick. He won seven senior football championship titles with his club Dromcollogher-Broadford.
 Noonan was a selector with the Limerick minor football team in 2013 and 2014. The West Limerick native has worked with his way up the ranks and he managed the Limerick U15 football team in 2024.

He has previously worked as chairman of the Limerick post primary schools. Noonan is a teacher at Coláiste na Trócaire, Rathkeale and he said the majority of his players are playing at the lower levels of the Munster football post-primary championships.

He does feel that the introduction of a combined Limerick schools team in the Corn Uí Mhuirí will be a major positive for football in Limerick.

“You are selecting players that haven't been exposed to that high level of football at post-primary level. It's definitely a challenge, (a Limerick combined schools team) definitely serves a purpose. However, you've got to remember that it's purpose is to expose the players to that level of competition and to that standard of football.

“It's not going to solve all the problems but it certainly will help. For those players that will get that exposure it will be hugely beneficial for them. If you just look across post-primary schools football in Limerick as a whole, we've got no schools competing at ‘A’ level, a minority of schools competing at ‘B’ level and the majority of schools play ‘C’ and ‘D’ competitions,” added Noonan.

The Limerick minor footballers have undergone trials in recent weeks and the preparations have went well according to their manager.

“It's been good, we've held five weeks of trials at the beginning. We've seen quite a number of players in excess of seventy players through the whole process. Since then, we've the panel down to in or around forty players.”

Noonan replaces Micheal Lenihan as manager of the Limerick minor football team. Limerick finished in third place of phase one of the Munster minor football championship recording victories over Tipperary and Waterford and they narrowly missed out on qualifying for the knockout stages of the Munster MFC this year.

The Shannnonsiders then entered tier three of the All-Ireland championship where they were defeated by Wicklow at the quarter-final stage. The three games against Waterford, Clare and Tipperary at the start of the Munster championship are the focus for Limerick, according to Noonan.

“We're just looking to prepare the team as best as we can and to have team ready and competitive when it comes to championship. We are not looking beyond our first three games and we will see where that takes us.

“For these young lads to see the Limerick seniors having days out in Croke Park is brilliant. It really give these lads something to aim for and that's every players dream to play on days like that. In Limerick football, we don't get too many days like that, that's the goal and it's what we aim to achieve,” he said.