The Ban is Back

Was talking to an Under 14 mentor the other night, his team are struggling a bit in the league at the moment, it turns out that one of his midfielders and his centre back are involved in a soccer competition called the Kennedy cup. It also turns out that these soccer players have had to sign a contract stating that they will not play any other sports for the duration of this competition.
I Googled this Kennedy Cup, it's run by an organisation called the SFAI or the Schoolboys Football Association of Ireland. it runs until the 15th June when the trophy finalist (for 25/26th position) are played.
Asking around it seems that this ban is widespread, all kids that want to play in this competition have to sign this contract. One of the Under 16 finalists a few weeks back in division 4 was also missing a player due to him having to sign a contract stopping him playing a sport other than soccer. It seems some kids sign the thing, and play other sports anyway, others sign it and stick to it and other kids refuse to sign it and play soccer anyway.
The GAA got a lot of criticism, and rightly so for having a ban on other sports, yet I don't see too many of the medja up in arms of this ban.
Supposing the Kildare development squads were to bring in a similar contract-if you wanted to play county football you couldn't play any other sports-I imagine there would be a bit of a storm, yet the GAA and other sports are supposed to suck it up when the SFAI decide to institute a ban.
Another thing that strikes me about this ban, The FAI are currently launching a bid, along with the other Celtic nations for Euro 2020, this is some sort of an underhanded attempt to stop Turkey getting the competition. The hierarchy in the GAA have stated that they would welcome an approach to helping to host this competition. At the same time Soccer is stopping Kids playing other sports, including GAA.
The GAA needs to learn to fight it's corner and stop being a Patsy for John Delaney and his rotten organisation. Kids should be free to play any sports they like without undue pressure being placed on them by a self appointed bunch of idiots.

Rugby Schools have been doing similar for years

OK the odd brave lad ignores their ban but its stops most playing hurling or football.

And you thing for one second the Times, Indo or Sindo would say boo--------- 2 chances.

There had always been 3 bans, only one ever got coverage.

I can vouch for what your saying being accurate STS (the club would have been expected to put in a reasonable showing at that age grade in that division ?) ,its been going on for a few years now . Inevitably a few promising players will find themselves falling between two stools and not excelling at either sport.As you say ,imagine the furore if that had been a gaa initiative.Wonder why Keys or Breheny arent giving this a mention seeing as most of what theyre writing(and i use the term loosely) seems to be rehashs of threads appearing here.

im just after comin back from a my club 14s game , we lost by probably 30 pts . The reason for this was 2 off there best players are banned from playin other sports for 6 weeks because off involvement with the kennedy cup squad . The kennedy cup squad last year had a 10 day ban on other sports , last year parents had to sign contracts that meant anyone on the kildare kennedy cup squad could not play soccer outside off kildare for a year . Whatever about the contract being legal or not , players not being allowed play with there clubs because off soccer doesnt sit well with me. I will be bringing it up at club and board na nog level , i hope that everyone interested in kildare gaa does the same .

I'd doubt you will be allowed bring it up at Bord na nOg and why should you. It's a seperate sporting organisation and none of GAA's business.

GAa cannot afford to criticise any other associations rules. Their own are a disgrace!

Think ur missin my point bta, i dont think soccer should have exclusive rights to any players . You ll find that some off that soccer squad are also on kildares u14 devolpment squad , should they be allowed to represent kildare if there not available for there clubs . Im not against soccer , a member off my family has played kennedy cup and was on a county devolpment squad., The kids are caught in the croossfire .Kdul and board na nog should discuss this for the kids sake . This is certainly an issue for board na nog and and my club and it will be discussed .

Until the GAA get their own house in order they have no business interfering in other organisations.
How many county U/16's, minors or U/21's are told not to play for their own club in football? And they're not even allowed think about playing soccer or rugby.

People in glass houses!

It's up to the GAA to ensure that our "product" is better. This ban by the other shower doesn't seem to be good form but I'd say let them at it. We all know that football and hurling are more attractive sports in terms of playing at a reasonably competitive level so these lads can make their own choices as they grow up.

Cilldara_2000 wrote:

We all know that football and hurling are more attractive sports in terms of playing at a reasonably competitive level

Really? Maybe you need to go have a chat with Kevin Feely of Bohs. Brian Murphy of QPR, Jamie Heaslip, Geordan Murphy and any other aspiring sports star who wants to make a career for themselves

The GAA cannot offer lads anything - soccer, rugby, golf etc can offer them lucrative high paid contracts & careers.

The days of GAA clubs assuming a kid should play football first are well & truly gone!

Well I wasn't referring to lads going abroad to play soccer or even League of Ireland soccer but I think the point stands as regards local soccer, if you compare amateur level to amateur level.

To the best of my knowledge, these Kennedy cup squads are for the elite players - the best available.
Similarly most young players who are good at soccer tend to be good at football and/or hurling aswell. By locking them into this agreement they are securing their talent for a fixed period & putting them in a shop window for scouts from god knows where. It's a shrewd move and another step ahead for the soccer boys. As was the move to Summer soccer.

The GAA have been slipping behind the other sports in recent years in terms of promoting, packaging and generally selling the sport. With the emergence of Leinster in the rugby world, Inwouldnt expect things to get any easier either

Quite sure some lads will always just prefer one over the other and so on. We just need to be sure that we continue to improve what we're offering (EG the development squad set up (IE our own elite players) has been hugely improved in recent years) so that we will continue to attract the best lads.

Aside from the compensation issue, it's far, far more glamorous for any player to play in front of 80,000 people in a championship game in Croke Park than anything the FAI have to offer. Even playing for a big club is better than a lot of what the League of Ireland has to offer and is substantially better than most amateur local soccer.

So, we don't need to get our knickers in a twist over this. We just need to look after our own shop.

The GAA has little to worry about as far as soccer or rugby taking over at national level. Such premonitions have been made for decades and have never materialised. Domestic soccer in Ireland is on its knees with almost all of the big clubs in dire financial trouble. Rugby has made strides but is still miles behind in the popularity stakes. How many rugby clubs in Kildare for example - Barnhall, Naas, Clane, Cill Dara, North Kildare, Athy and Newbridge. Compare that to the number of GAA clubs.

The one advantage they do have at a local level is that young lads are guaranteed a regular schedule of games that you can set your watch by. They know that every Saturday morning or whatever, there'll be a match of some description. This is not the case with football or hurling where the fixture list is all over the shop and nobody knows for sure when and where matches will take place. All young lads want to do is play (not train) so you can see why soccer and rugby are becoming genuine alternatives. Sorting out the fixture lists is the major challenge facing the GAA.

Agree with some of your points KK all you have to do is go over to Hawkfield and do a head count of the number of elite players in the development squads who choose Gaa,

Kennedy cup is sold as a shop window for aspiring young soccer players, parents soon find out that in fact they have been sold a pup. I have seen one of these contracts, the thing that jumped out at me was the fee that was payable to the KDSL if a player was signed or moved to another district, inmo its just taking advantage of the kids

I don't agree with your view about fixtures, most of my clubs underage teams except minor and u16 are playing competition at the moment and they have a game every week without fail. Minor and u16 will resume as soon as the exams are finished.


BTA you have one serious chip, care to enlighten us as to the cause !!

ballyboy wrote:

I don't agree with your view about fixtures, most of my clubs underage teams except minor and u16 are playing competition at the moment and they have a game every week without fail. Minor and u16 will resume as soon as the exams are finished.

The situation has improved in recent years but the ratio of traning to matches in football and hurling at underage level is still too high IMO. The way some GAA coaches carry on as regards training probably helps drive many young lads away from the games - all you want to do at that age is just play matches and the more of them, the better. I've no evidence to back this up but it seems to me that there are more frequent and regular matches for underage soccer players; maybe I'm wrong?

KK the Under 16 competition has just finished, the under 14 league has had three or four rounds played, so I think regular competition is not the issue here.
I think most posters here have made valid points, ie the GAA needs to market their product better, and create a bit of interest around their competitions. Look at the Leader each week, the amount of Soccer results and match reports is startling, meanwhile there is six or seven divisions of Under 14 football (for example) taking place every week and not a mention, not a result, not a match report or photograph.
However, all that is for another day. My concern is the fact that this so called contract excludes other sports, why put this pressure on juveniles. Why is the County Board not doing something to help the smaller clubs where one or two players can be the difference between competing or getting hammered.
Like I stated in my original post there is a golden opportunity now with the spurious Euro 2020 bid for the GAA to stand up for themselves and say no deal unless you cut out this contract business.