Football

Armagh being 'hung, drawn and quartered' for training camp in April: assistant boss Jim McCorry

The Armagh squad have came in for some criticism for going on a training camp during the club-only month of April
The Armagh squad have came in for some criticism for going on a training camp during the club-only month of April The Armagh squad have came in for some criticism for going on a training camp during the club-only month of April

ARMAGH’S assistant manager Jim McCorry says the senior panel had already been “hung, drawn and quartered” for allegedly breaching the GAA’s club-only policy by going on a four-day training camp to Portugal.

Armagh, along with other county teams, went ahead with their training camp plans last month and, as a consequence, they could forfeit home advantage in one of their NFL games next season.

However, McCorry insisted every stakeholder within the Orchard County agreed to their plans for April and that they’d complied with rule.

Counties may have already signed off on their training camp plans before the GAA made rule changes relating to club action only in April.

The Armagh squad spent four days in the Portuguese resort of Vilamoura – Wednesday to Sunday of last week – in preparation for their May 19 Championship showdown with Fermanagh at Brewster Park.

“I think people are jumping the gun about regulations and what the rules are,” McCorry said at this week’s Ulster Championship launch in Strabane.

“The way it was reported, people were judge, jury and executioner about us going away when we were trying to do something that the players wanted, that the county wanted, and we're being hung, drawn and quartered for something without anybody even fully speaking properly to us about it, so let's just see what happens through the proper process.”

There has been plenty of criticism of the club-only month of April with some hurling county management teams bemoaning the lack of preparation ahead of their Championship games scheduled for this weekend.

McCorry added: “We arranged under the proper guidelines to be heading away at this time. Four weeks was our target prior to the Championship game to give us that four days of intensive work.

“It was all game-planning work with the ball, proper work, so that would lead us into the last three weeks heading into the Championship.

“As regards compliance with the April rule, we complied with that in terms of all our players were released to the clubs for club games. The final game on Sunday - the day we came home - was changed to Monday night so the games could have been played then, but my understanding was that the clubs preferred to have these games deferred, so they could play these games at a later date with the county players with them.

“We came home on Sunday, so they could have played for the clubs on Monday but the clubs preferred to play the games at a later date. They played the three Sundays in April.”

In an earlier group interview, Fermanagh assistant manager Ryan ‘Ricey’ McMenamin mentioned Armagh’s four-day training camp at the end of April.

McCorry responded: “If people get motivation out of something another team does, then fill your boots with it. As far as we're concerned, we're concerned with ourselves and our own preparation and if others want to use whatever we're doing to motivate them, fire away on that.

“Our guys were away and didn't really want to come home - not because it was a holiday, we worked very hard the whole time, but because it was so enjoyable.

“The taste of what they had, compared to what they did back home, was much more enjoyable for them and we are looking forward now to using what we did in the four days away for the next three weeks in preparation for the Fermanagh game.”