Board vow to support Keaney on both sides

Dublin stance on dual playersThe Dublin County Board has denied there is any confusion on the issue of dual players in the county.

County secretary John Costello said it was up to individual players to decide whether they want to play one or both games and if they decide they want to do both, the county board would do its best to facilitate that choice.

The most prominent player attempting a dual career is last year's hurling All Star nominee Conal Keaney who has also graduated from the county's All-Ireland winning under-21s to making his senior competitive football debut last weekend.

"He expressed interest in playing both," said Costello, "and we support that. The week before last the footballers wanted him for the challenge against Derry but the hurlers' Walsh Cup fixture took precedence. Then last weekend the National Football League took precedence over the Walsh Cup."

In addition, any dual players will train with the team that's scheduled to play competitively the following weekend. The exercise will become more fraught next month when on the weekends of March 14th and 21st the GAA has scheduled double fixtures. Dublin hope to secure the permission of Waterford and Laois to play these matches on the Saturday, freeing up Keaney to line out with the footballers the following day.

But for all the co-operation, Costello feels that dual activity is becoming increasingly difficult. "The reality now since the qualifiers were introduced is that it's more and more difficult to play both. For a start we don't even know our schedule at this stage.

"We have two county teams and the likelihood is that we will lose in one of them anyway at some stage.

"Until that happens we don't know our qualifier schedule but once a team goes into that series fixtures come thick and fast. If you take that situation, the footballers might have a fortnight between games but the hurlers might be out in between. In that interval the hurlers could be playing.

"Teams don't do very much the week before a match: light training, tactics and videos. So a dual player could find himself doing no hard training over a number of weeks. But having said that, it is workable once you sit down and sort it out."

Meanwhile, it has emerged that Monday's Dublin County Board meeting didn't have much time to consider the issue of non-native players declaring for the county and will return to the subject at the March meeting. Focus has fallen on this matter because of the declaration for Dublin of former Fermanagh player Rory Gallagher, who now lives in the county and plays for Leinster champions St Brigid's.

His cousin and club-mate Raymond recently also announced he was withdrawing from the Fermanagh panel although he made no declaration for his county of residence.

The county board debate was held in camera but although the meeting went on for over three hours, most of the business was local administrative housekeeping.

"It was our first meeting since Christmas," said Costello, "and we had elections to the Management Committee and discussions on the structures of local competitions."

Not alone did the declaration issue not go to a vote but according to Costello, "the debate isn't over yet and will resume next month".

Speaking generally on the subject he said: "A number of delegates made a distinction between established county players coming to Dublin and players from elsewhere coming up through the system.

"Another issue is residency. A footballer comes up from, say, Cork and gets a job as a teacher and decides to settle. The housing market in Dublin means he might have to buy a home outside of the county. If he buys somewhere like Ashbourne or Naas, he's no longer eligible as a Dublin resident."

The other side of the coin is the impact of migrant players on the playing structures of clubs and even the county. "The development squads have been working hard in the county," said Costello, "and we've contested well at minor and under-21 level recently.

"Why undo that work by fast-tracking established intercounty players into clubs? If there is a strong juvenile section what sort of message is being sent out to young players? Having worked through underage they find themselves in competition not only with senior club players but with star players from other counties."