Counter Attack
Edwin McGreal
THIS writer was amused when recently reading another regional newspaper elsewhere in the country. In the paper was a column written about the response the columnist had received in relation to a quote he had published in a report from an underage soccer match.
The quote, made by a mother of one of the losing team, was ‘how can you compete with a side that has poached so much talent?’
The writer explained that he used such a quote to merely ‘add colour’ to his report and that it was never his intention to ‘provoke any anger’.
Needless to say he didn’t get what he wished for. The comment went down like a lead balloon with the club it was aimed at. And well it might. It was a serious claim passed off in a flippant way and the issue, while undoubtedly a topical one, only annoyed people rather than properly examining the claim.
Certainly I know that if a report in The Mayo News made such a frivolous reference to any club in the county, we’d hear all about it, and rightly so.
But it doesn’t mean that the issue shouldn’t be addressed at all. Rather the obligation is on the media to deal with such conjecture in a fair, balanced and thorough way.
We could put our heads in the sand about such allegations in Mayo but the reality is that they have been made.
It’s no secret that Castlebar Celtic are the club in question with people questioning the influx of players from outside of Castlebar to Celtic’s youth ranks.
The widespread opinion would appear to be that Celtic are the wrongdoers, ‘taking’ players from other clubs. But it is not as simple as that.
The players in question happen to be among the best in the county at their grade. They will obviously be losses to their clubs but because Celtic have such a strong youth set-up, they are the club in Mayo with the best chance of success in the external competitions.
For the players in question that is a major attraction. Many still have hopes of playing professional soccer, either in England or, with the greater opportunities now available here, in the eircom League.
Playing with Celtic will, in all probability, give them a better gateway in that direction, particularly with Celtic now operating in the eircom U-21 League. But there are clear downsides.
While Celtic become strong nationally, competition at local level becomes almost non-existent because of the Castlebar club’s strength.
Other clubs, already struggling at the underage grades after U-14 (grades which need a lot of work but that’s an issue for another day) suffer even more if they lose one or two key players. It has knock-on effects and other players might ask why bother playing if they are losing important players.
That can, for all the work the club is doing, lead to a major fall-off in playing numbers and down the line affect their Junior side (s).
Remedial action isn’t obvious. To lay the blame squarely at Castlebar Celtic’s door is unfair. They will argue that they are just trying to better themselves. They have become a version of many of the feeder clubs elsewhere in the country; the Belvederes of Dublin and Salthill Devons of Galway who attract players from outside their immediate area.
In the past, and even currently, young Mayo players travelled to Dublin to play with sides like Belvedere. Is it not now better that there is a club in Mayo that can provide that level of standard?
There is no easy solution here but there has to be a recognition in the first place that there is a problem. It is an issue that won’t go away.
