Ger Loughnane slams Clare’s small skilful hurlers and accuses chairman of using role for political gain

Shooting from the hip

Ger Loughnane is the Clare and Irish version of Jose Mourinho. Put a microphone in front of him and you are guaranteed something golden will drop out of his mouth. And that's exactly what happened in this week's edition of the Clare Champion, as Loughnane has absolutely savaged the Clare county board and in particular its chairman Michael 'Malty' McDonagh. Last week in the newspaper Brian Lohan suggested that the former All-Ireland winning manger be handed a role on a committee tasked to look at everything to do with the senior hurlers performance following yet another disappointing championship campaign. Despite the loss to Cork earlier this month, the Clare county board chairman endorsed Davy Fitzgerald to continue with his work, and said his role was not up for debate or review. This has angered Loughnane who feels that the whole situation is being badly handled by the executive

"I think the chairman’s position, by his actions, is completely and utterly untenable. If we want to have a future, we need to look at the whole set-up and that includes officers in the county board. Have we the right officers to pursue the right agenda for the future? “His interest is short-term and his interest is not on the future of Clare hurling. He is pursuing a political career and all of his utterances and actions are aiming to improve his status in that area. “It has nothing whatsoever to do with the future of Clare hurling. It’s just a PR exercise that is so badly carried out that it’s an insult to people’s intelligence that he thinks he is getting away with it.”

https://twitter.com/KMcGillicuddy86/status/626672856248791040 McDonagh is putting his name forward as a possible candidate for Fianna Fail at their selection convention in Ennis this Friday for the upcoming General Election. He has responded to the comments this afternoon and denied ther accusations he's using his role within the GAA to further a possible political career

"The suggestion that any comments I have made are self-serving or politically motivate are wrong, and appear to me to be intentionally misleading and intended to damage my candidacy in Friday's Fianna fail selction convention." "In politics as in life it is nearly as important to have the right people against you as it is to have the right people for you"

 

Loughnane feels that the county have pursued the wrong policy in terms of developing players, and cites the example of the man-of-the-match from Galway's win over Cork, who according to Loughnane, would not be considered for Clare due to his physique.

"If Johnny Glynn was in Clare as a minor or U16 he'd be dumped long ago. He wouldn't have been tolerated. We have over-emphasised this whole small fast skilful thing. The balance is not right and it's leaving us very one dimensional. We need to bring in bigger stronger stronger players who mightn't be great at U14 or U15 but have potential if developed properly." "There has to be a review of the whole appraoch in Clare, not alone our senior team but the approach all the way down."

Loughnane also feels the fact that Cork, who beat Clare in the All-Ireland qualifers and got so badly beaten by Galway now makes the situation in Clare are the more worrying

"I said that after the Cork game that it was crisis time. We were beaten by Limerick,who we we all know now are pathetic. Last Sunday's result has exacerbated the whole thing."

H/T Clare Champion