NO RAIN ON THE PARADE The Galway and Mayo teams parade behind the Castlebar Concert Band before last year’s Connacht SFC semi-final at MacHale Park. Rugby teams could be playing at the Castlebar venue in the future. Pic: Sportsfile
Cormac O’Malley
Straide
THE Rugby World Cup is coming to MacHale Park, Castlebar … possibly!
One obstacle to such a scenario was cleared without much trouble, or indeed fanfare, at a Mayo GAA Board meeting held last Monday week at the Michael Davitt Museum in Straide. Delegates voted unanimously to allow MacHale Park to be used in the event of Ireland being selected as hosts of the 2023 Rugby World Cup.
The IRFU, with the backing of the Irish government, are currently duking it out with Six Nations rivals France for the right to host the rugby carnival after Japan’s turn in 2019.
Should Ireland be successful in their bid, then the next stage comes when they whittle the proposed long list of 12 stadiums to a possible eight. Mayo GAA HQ is just one of two potential venues in Connacht alongside Pearse Stadium in Galway – the Sportsground, home of Connacht Rugby, was not considered.
The County Board, in association with Mayo.ie have recently released a video, complete with Rugby World Cup branding, showcasing MacHale Park, so had their been objections to allowing non-GAA games be played in the venue, there could have been the potential for massive embarrassment. As it was, with no dissent from the floor, it is full steam ahead to one day see Fiji versus Tonga on the hallowed sod of the county ground!
Minor fixtures postponed
A TRIO of Connacht titles and two All-Ireland triumphs for Mayo schools has come at a cost for the Mayo minors, County Board delegates were told last Monday week.
Bord na nÓg chairman Con Moynihan revealed that until this week, because of the success of Our Lady’s Secondary School Belmullet in winning the All-Ireland Post-Primary Schools Senior ‘D’ Championship, Ballinrobe Community School’s run to a thrilling Croke Park
win in the Senior ‘B’ Championship at the start of April, and St Colman’s drive to an All Ireland ‘A’ semi-final, the county minor squad has been unable to train together since the start of the year.
New Mayo minor manager Damien Gavin was without up to a dozen of his panel until Ballinrobe CS completed the schools’ competitions for the 2016/17 season, and because of the delay in getting the whole panel together, there has in turn been push-back on county league fixtures.
Mr Moynihan said in his address to the meeting that in order to give Mr Gavin and his back-room team the requisite preparation time for their preliminary round Connacht Championship clash with Galway on Saturday, April 29, several rounds of the county league have had to be postponed until May.
Mr Moynihan noted that the fixture conundrum was exacerbated by the fact that Mayo have been placed in the preliminary round so early in the year. Having a preliminary round in April was something that both Mayo and Galway voted against at a Connacht GAA meeting last year, he added.
While there was some questions from delegates as to why the preparation time allowed was greater than the required 13 days for county teams, Mr Moynihan returned to the issue of the squad not having been together as a group until their training session last Thursday (April 6).
