Last Saturday, our Derry team (not the board's) were scheduled to play a challenge match against the Superblues, then travel on to Limerick for an outdoor pursuits weekend. After taking a battering in the latter part of the league, it was to have been a very important morale boost. Outdoor pursuits - canoeing, letting the hair down, swimming with naked females in the twilight, you know the sort of thing. The players would have been really looking forward to it. It was very disappointing that this didn't happen. What could have been better than a challenge game played at 100 mph against a top six side, followed by three days of fun and frolics? It didn't happen because of the unreasonable, petty behaviour of some board members.
At the start of the season I understand it was agreed between the Games Administration Committee and the senior manager that the weekend would be left free for a players' trip. So league games were to be fixed for the Friday night. Then about a week before the row, the opportunity for the Dublin game presented itself. Of course this was a great idea. All it required was the committee to reschedule the Friday fixtures. In the meantime, the committee had already put the two fingers up by actually scheduling some league games for the Sunday, which would have meant several players missing the trip to Limerick. So the management requested the Committee move the Friday and Sunday fixtures to another date. The suggestion was they could be played either on the Thursday night or three days after the Tyrone game.
The GAC has plenary powers - they and they alone decide when games will be played and when they can be moved. It will be readily appreciated that drawing up the fixtures is a mammoth task. Dovetailing hurling and football at all levels and venues is a logistical nightmare. But this was not a big deal. A minor adjustment was all that was required - stroke out Friday, pencil in Thursday. I think the fixtures committee would probably have wakened on the following morning to find that the sky hadn't fallen on our heads after-all. But no, pettiness prevailed. Paddy Crozier and several senior players attended a special meeting of the fixtures committee convened to discuss the request. I understand that Paddy was treated like an errand boy in front of his players. This is not acceptable to the Derry GAA community. Our manager - not the board's - must be treated with respect. No official is bigger than Derry GAA and the sooner a few members of the board begin to appreciate that they are there to serve us, or better still the sooner reasonable adults replace them, the sooner this sort of episode will be a thing of the past. In any event, Paddy was given the high hat, essentially told to f…… off. No wonder he immediately resigned.
Club players can't be of course be forgotten about, but this was one night, and the players on this squad don't need refresher courses on the importance of commitment to their clubs. The Bellaghy contingent came straight to Derry training from a marathon season, having won their twenty somethingth championship and narrowly lost an Ulster final. The Loup boys did exactly the same two years ago. From Paddy Bradley through to the number 30, these boys are the stalwarts of their club teams, rarely missing a game.
At the Under 21 Ulster final, I saw the Derry lads leaving the field in Ballybofey with their gear on, trudging to their cars and heading for their league games at 7.00 p.m.. This is not good enough. They were dehydrated, exhausted, limbs were sore and muscles tight. Paddy had asked the Fixtures Committee to move those games but again in terms was told to f…. off. It is a ridiculous scenario. The current impasse has ended because the committee has finally agreed to move the league games from this Saturday. Originally, the players were to take part in league games on Saturday evening and then turn out for the county in an important challenge match with Fermanagh within eighteen hours, a recipe for injury. I appreciate there is a balancing act, but to simply ride roughshod over the manager is not good enough.
That said, the Manager taking up an extreme position is not a good thing. Once you say ' f… it, I'm off' it only tends to increase the problem. It ensures that the opposing sides dig their heels in, and the opportunity for diplomacy recedes. There is a bigger picture here. I suppose the squad could have accepted the decisions and soldiered on in the general good. But extreme positions are often the result of provocation and I understand the treatment of the manager at the fixtures committee meeting was enough to make a dog eat its granny. Senior players witnessed this humiliation and in the circumstances, it is entirely understandable a) why Paddy threw up the head and b) that his players stood by him.
There are important long term issues at stake here. Firstly and most importantly, there is plenty of dead wood in the Board that must be replaced by more reasonable, harder working, constructive people who want to serve the Derry GAA community. The clubs must start to return good members. There is no point complaining about the dinosaurs if we keep electing them.
Secondly, players cannot be expected to play two competitive games within 24 hours. Boys want to play as hard as they can for their clubs, and our lads will never go out and go through the motions in those games. At the same time, county challenge games at this time of the year, in particular for a squad in the early stages of development, are very important and must be played as though they are championship. Boys must be fresh, otherwise they cannot give of their best. Tired bodies are a fertile breeding ground for injury.
The squad and Board must pull in the same direction. In a way, the squad will be happy so long as they are left in peace, but you cannot have a situation where a few board members are deliberately and unreasonably obstructing them.
In the short term, it is all very disappointing and naturally Paddy Crozier and the players are angry, but the funny thing is that it will galvanise them, bring them even closer together. Managers often work hard to create a siege mentality - 'the world is against us' sort of thing. Jose Mourinho bellyaches about referees conspiring to rob his team. Alex Ferguson is exactly the same. Mickey Harte - after his second All-Ireland in three years - said 'Well I hope finally you people in the media might give us a wee bit of credit'. The important thing is that the squad and management are united. After that, everything else can be overcome, even Board room pettiness. Doire abu.