12 players that left Mayo ladies panel speak publicly for the first time

Major developments in the Mayo ladies saga.

The 12 players that stepped away from the Mayo ladies football squad during the summer spoke for the first time at a select press briefing on Monday night. The players were joined by two former members of the backroom team, who had opted to step away in support of them. https://twitter.com/sineadkissane/status/1041932492893298688 The players denied that they left the panel due to selection issues and insisted the decision to step away was in no way orchestrated by forward Cora Staunton. Staunton, Fiona MacHale and former captain Sarah Tierney all spoke during the briefing, as well as ex-selector Fiona McDonagh. Tierney broke down in tears as she spoke about matters that led to their decision to leave en-masse in July.

"We did not step away from Mayo football because of one or two people. Each one in this group of us witnessed or experienced an environment that we felt we could not operate or stay within."

Mayo News were present at the briefing as were RTE and TV3, who will run more on the matter from 8am. Ahead of that, the broadcaster mentioned the story in their sports bulletins. Mayo ladies boss Peter Leahy appeared on The GAA Hour last Wednesday in response, he said, to comments from Staunton on Off The Ball AM, when she claimed she 'did not feel it [the panel] was a safe environment'. Leahy told Colm Parkinson:

"The word unsafe is the reason I'm here. It's not just for me, it's my full management team. I've a chartered physio at every training session, we've live heart-rate monitoring so that none of the girls are overworked, we've stuff that no other inter-county team has, we've a meal after every training session, a fully qualified S and C coach... "We have what some senior men's teams don't even have."

You can read more comments from the players, and a full statement, here.