This article is from page 88 of the 2009-01-20 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 88 JPG
THE crowd disturbance that marred the end of last July’s Munster Under 21 hurling final between Clare and Tipperary has roared to public atten- tion again this week — all because the GAA authorities have issued a stark warning to the Clare County Board to get its house in order or run the risk of facing heavy fines and losing out on big-time fixtures at Cusack Park.
On Thursday, county board secre- tary Pat Fitzgerald admitted to club delegates from around the county that the GAA authorities have rapped Clare on the knuckles over the stew- arding arrangements in place for the provincial decider that ended in a
welter of controversy when Limer- ick referee Jason O’ Mahony awarded Tipperary a match-winning 65-metre free.
‘There was a lot of discussion here about the Under 21 final, but the next time we have a big game we have to have ourselves organised. We will not get away with what we did be- fore,” said Fitzgerald.
“T can tell you that that’s coming from way higher than us and we have to comply. I hope and I know that Clare was never found wanting in the past and we won’t be this time.
“We have given a commitment that there will be a team of stewards put in place and trained and ready for 1
Fitzgerald’s words of warning about
the county board’s responsibility for dealing with potential crowd trouble at Cusack Park were echoed by the chairman of the Clare GAA’s Facili- ties Committee, John Fawl.
“It is coming from other higher au- thorities. We are not going to be let away with what we did with Tipper- ary and Clare in the Under 21. We have to be able to control these situa- tions,” he said.
To this end, the county board have appealed for clubs to come for- ward with names to boost steward- ing numbers at Cusack Park for big games. “We would be asking clubs to go back and look at potential people to help to manage fixtures in Cusack Park,” said Pat Fitzgerald.
“We have some games come up in
the near future. We now have to have stewards who are trained and who know what they are doing. The next two weeks we will be hoping to put together a group of 20 or 30.
‘We would ask that the people are nominated are suitable for the job — not just a name.
“We all realise what happened in the past and it is important that when it does come down to it that we put people forward who are going to be are capable of doing the job when the time is right,” Fitzgerald added.