McCarthy may address County Board meeting

ACCORDING to Limerick County Board chairman Liam Lenihan it is a distinct possibility that senior hurling manager Justin McCarthy will address next Thursday night’s special County Board meeting in the Community Centre in Ballyagran at 7.30pm.


The meeting on December 3 has been convened to discuss the crisis surrounding the Limerick senior hurling panel and for delegates to vote on the ‘GAA/GPA proposal’ - like every other county in the country Limerick must discuss the proposed alignment of the GPA and GAA and decide to agree or disagree with the proposal before a meeting of Central Council on December 5 in Croke Park.
On Thursday night last (November 26) the County Board met with members of the 2009 hurling panel to discuss the fall out from Justin McCarthy’s wholesale changes to the senior hurling squad - McCarthy dropped 12 players while a further eight walked out in protest.
This morning County Board chairman Liam Lenihan described that meeting as “open and frank” and that the County Board executive will convey the views of the players to Thursday night’s meeting in Ballyagran.
“We had an open and frank meeting on Thursday night,” Liam Lenihan told Leader Sport on Monday morning.
“We got our views on the situation across and they got their views across.
“We will now convey those views to Thursday night’s meeting and move on from there.”
The starting time, originally 6.30pm, and the venue for the meeting raised eyebrows across the county, but County Board officials have now moved the meeting back to 7.30pm to allow delegates sufficient time to reach the venue - the Limerick executive insist that they planned the meeting to co-incide with the launch of the Limerick GAA Yearbook which takes place in Mark Foley’s Bar later that evening in Ballyagran (9.30pm).
In an extraordinary departure the special County Board meeting will be held in camera. Limerick GAA chairman Liam Lenihan confirmed to Leader Sport last week that an executive meeting of County Board officers had taken the decision to exclude members of the media from the meeting in Ballyagran.
Earlier last week former Limerick GAA chairman Denis Holmes led the calls for the scheduling of a County Board meeting to discuss the latest saga to engulf Limerick hurling. At the annual convention of the East Board in Ahane chairman Denis Holmes said that the clubs of the county need to be heard.

Brian Mcdonnell