Éire Óg Greystones
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Weekly Notes - 25th April 2007

The widely held conception of sport as a panacea for social ills has much of "the looking at the world through rose coloured glasses" in it. While sport, particularly team sport, does afford a structural environment for the channelling of physical energy, for social interaction - unfortunately in this country often stratified - and the development of team spirit, it is in fact essentially amoral and in itself is neither a force for good or ill. Rather it is the ethos in which it is conducted that is the determining factor as to its efficacy in the development of the individual and to the effecting of a positive influence in society. It seems to me that if a sport is not geared primarily to the improvement of participants as persons ( physically, emotionally etc) its role is, to say the least, questionable. The advent of professionalism in a sport has a profound effect at underage level as it must then be structured to aliment the professional ranks. In this context it is worth quoting a few lines from an article in Saturday's Irish Times " If we are to remain at the top we have got to have bodies to compete at the highest level. That means, fortunately or unfortunately, conditioning players earlier. Whether either morally or conscience-wise it's something we parents would want, goes by the board when the game is professional". "In Australia the game has to fend off competition from within. Guys of other sports offer financial incentives to children as young as 14 and 15 to sign contracts". "Competition from other sports pushes that competitive environment down to a younger age". Thankfully, because of the amateur status of the G.A.A., players at underage level are not subject to such pressures. Might this not be used as a selling point in the promotion of our games?

Our minors travelled to Carnew on Sunday morning for their return game against the locals in the championship. What value home advantage? In Greystones our lads drew with Carnew and might easily have won but were well beaten on Sunday. I am reliably informed - if such can be said of information obtained on Sunday night in the Orchard! - that the scoreboard gives a very false picture of the course of the game. The half-time score was 0-5 to 0-4 in Carnew's favour. Éire Óg strove gallantly in a robust but generally sporting 2nd half. However, they were eventually worn down by the superior physicality of the opposition and conceded 2-2 in the last 7 minutes. The Éire Óg tally over the hour speaks of an off-day among its forwards. Indeed, apart from Peter Keane who had an excellent game, the attack was largely ineffective. The back division, on the other hand, has many heroes not least among whom was Andrew Molloy. Andrew, despite being hampered by a hamstring injury, gave a 'man of the match' performance. Dean Healy was a very effective half-back, and full-backs Jack Tanner and Fintan Donnelly defended with bravery and determination.

On Wednesday a parent watching his u-10 son training took time to look across at our u-14Bs in action against An Tochar and remarked at how impressed he was at the skill of the players and on how intelligently they were using the ball. Plaudits fully merited because these two teams served up a very enjoyable, exciting and constructive game of football. The foundations of the Éire Óg victory were put down early on with two very well worked goals finished by James Wood. At the interval we were well ahead. The Roundwood lads came out for the second half with all guns blazing and soon had our lead reduced to 3 points. It was at this juncture the team showed its character and thanks to sterling performances from Matt Maguire, Marco Petrasi, Raymond Crotty, Darren Callen, Gavin Parslow, Adam Manning and 'person of the match' Maebh Deeney, Éire Óg held out for victory.

Please remember that stubs for our Super Draw must be returned before the May bank holiday weekend.

We were sad to hear of the death of George Delaney of Kilcoole. All in Éire Óg extend their sincerest sympathies to his family and to the Kilcoole club. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam.