Bathshack Antrim SHC semi-final: Loughgiel Shamrocks v Cuchullain’s Dunloy (Sunday, 3.30pm, Ballycastle)
LOUGHGIEL manager Johnny Campbell says the situation for club players in the county was “dire” this year amid a long mid-season break.
Antrim, like other counties, took a decision to alleviate their county teams of the pressure of playing for their clubs during the height of their championship season.
As a result, the Shamrocks went 49 days without a game between April 15 and June 3, and then had a second spell with just one game between June 20 and July 22.
And when that second break ended with a trip to Ballycran, they ended up squeezed into playing four games in the next 13 days.
Campbell, who will be without Liam Watson (ankle ligaments) for this weekend’s Antrim SHC semi-final against champions Dunloy, says he does not envy the job of the fixture-makers – but that the situation this year would do serious damage to the club scene in Antrim if repeated.
“It’s dire for the ordinary club player. You hurl or play football to play games. I read a thing that said the ratio of club training to games is 15:1. It’s nuts.
“You can see why certain players go to America or England for the summer.
“Luckily we haven’t been too bad, but there’s other clubs like Rossa who have four or five away. If they’re not getting games, you can sort of understand it. It’s not nice for a manager but you can see where they’re coming from.
“We’ve been lucky enough this last few years, we’ve been in the mix for a championship and that has a bit of a pull. But that only lasts for so long. We’d a couple away last year, one in America and one in England.
“There are people coming with deals to players and I feel, long term, if it’s not looked at the club scene could die a wee bit up here because of it. We’re lucky enough we have numbers, but if big players from big clubs start to look at those deals, where does it stop?”
Former Antrim defender Campbell, who captained the Shamrocks to All-Ireland club success in 2012 and is now in his third year as manager, admits that because of Loughgiel’s healthy player base and their status as a single-code club, they’re in a more favourable position than others to play without county players.
But he says that the option of a league without relegation or promotion is something that could be examined in a bid to give players a more regular package of games.
“Ourselves, we’d play away but I understand we’re lucky with numbers, and not all the clubs are like that.
“But there could be some sort of league structure set up where you’re still playing league games without county players that maybe don’t affect the promotion or relegation, just to get boys games.
“You’re trying to progress players and games are the only way of finding out where they’re at. Whether it’s a league setup with no promotion or relegation for a year or two, I don’t know, that’s for the powers that be. But I definitely think something has to be looked at.
“The All-Irelands being sooner and them trying to condense the year, it’s not a job I would have liked, trying to get the fixtures in.
“Dunloy are probably feeling it worse being a dual club, so I’m glad I don’t have that problem. It can become hectic for players.
“They’re human too, they can go 100 per cent 100 per cent of the time, because that’s when things do break down.”
That’s all behind them now. The challenge in front of them is trying to stop a train before it finds its head of steam.
It had been eight years from Dunloy’s 2009 success until last year’s, and it was one that many felt came ahead of schedule.
As it happens, they were the two sides that topped the groups in the new-look round-robin system. But rather than the usual top-plays-second format, Antrim decided to have a draw for the semi-finals.
“The top two were going through and there was no real benefit to topping the group. It wasn’t 1v2 from the other group or anything like that,” said Campbell.
“The way they did that, it didn’t add the spice to what it could have had in the groups. But it’s two championship games under your belt.
“The like of St John’s have benefited greatly out of it. The last few years they’ve been beaten in the opening round, whereas they’ve already played four games the way their draw worked out, so they’ll play five at the very least. That could be massive for their development.
“From our point of view, other than having injuries and being able to mind them and give other boys championship hurling, there was no massive incentive to win the group.”
They went on ahead and won it anyway, hammering Rossa and then squeezing past a St John’s outfit that will fancy their chances of springing an upset against Cushendall in the weekend’s other semi-final.
Very little has changed for the Shamrocks in terms of personnel this season. Benny McCarry has been working away, while Barney McAuley is out for the foreseeable with a torn Achilles.
Other than that, the development of Ryan McKee has seen him force his way into the starting side, and while James McNaughton has also developed into a key cog in attack, it’s Dunloy whose teamsheet has the fresher look about it.
“We are in transition. I know that’s a word fired about brave and often with teams. We had success with a group of players and it has started to break up.
“There are fellas there and they’re there on merit. I’ve given championship debuts, fellas have won championships being on the pitch for the first time that first year I was in, and there were more debuts this year.
“You are trying to keep a freshness in it, but only on merit. You can’t force it just to bring the average age down a bit. There are definitely a few young ones coming through that will be good players for us in the years to come.”
