Sligo object to N.Y. trip

By Pierce O’Reilly

GAA officials in New York are livid that Sligo GAA officials are objecting to an expenses-paid trip to New York next May.

“It’s a complete joke,” GAA PRO John Moore said this week. “Roscommon tried that trick last year and we allowed it to happen. This year, we’re not budging.”

A row is brewing within the Sligo camp over the Connaught Council’s decision to grant New York home-field advantage in the first round of the football championship for the next five years.

“We’re not traveling in May and that’s that,” Sligo GAA chairman Joe Queenan said this week. “We have 10 members of our panel involved in college and university exams and we’re [not] heading to New York without them.”

Last February in Knock, Co. Mayo, the Connaught GAA board told New York GAA president Monty Moloney and vice president Liam Birmingham that if they played Roscommon in Ireland in 2001, they would not be expected to travel abroad for the next five years.

After three years of sending teams to Ireland for All-Ireland competitions, the New York chiefs had threatened to withdraw if the trend wasn’t reversed. A deal was struck and New York subsequently fulfilled their commitment to travel to Roscommon last May.

“The agreement is written in stone and it won’t be changed,” Moloney said. “The game will go ahead at Gaelic Park.”

Sligo would be the first Irish team to take the transatlantic trip.

“We’ve requested an urgent meeting with Connaught Council officials to discuss our grievances and right now it doesn’t look good; it’s simply a dangerous banana skin for us”, Queenan said. “It’s just not feasible for us to travel.”

Sligo feel that with several members of their team and management involved in education, either as students or teachers, it is not possible for them to travel in May, which is exam time.

They are also unhappy that amateur players and officials would have to take the best part of a week off work.

Connaught Council secretary John Prenty said he was amazed to hear that Sligo are now protesting.

“Everyone could see the problems Roscommon had when the decision was taken so late; this year Sligo really have no excuses,” he said. He also said that the Connaught Council would try to accommodate Sligo in every way possible.

“If May doesn’t suit, we’ll look at April or June,” he said.

The Yeats county officials, however, say they have a number of reasons for not traveling. They also say that it’s unfair to ask amateur players and officials to take at least a week of work to fulfill the fixture.

“No player should be out of pocket to play for his county,” Queenan said. “Who’ll come up with compensation for these guys.”

He also said that the Connaught Council may very well throw out this five-year plan if Sligo travel next year.

“Everyone agrees when they’re own County isn’t involved,” he said.

In response, Prenty said it would take a two-thirds vote from the respective Connaught Counties to reverse the decision.

“It could happen, but I don’t think the delegates will turn their back on New York,” he said. Queenan, however, remains adamant that Sligo won’t travel without a full panel.