Portlaoise's point taken

The Portlaoise club maintains that its confrontation with the Laois County Board and the threat to withdraw players and facilities from the county's teams has been worthwhile although a statement after Wednesday night's meeting between the county executive and the club confirms there have been no concessions to the club.

"I suppose we're happy enough that the executive acknowledged there was a problem between club and county," said Portlaoise chair Vincent Dowling. "We're disappointed that we had to lose the points from a match to show the extent of these problems."

The club had been docked the points for failing to fulfil a fixture with St Joseph's last Friday week in protest at the lack of time county players had been allocated for club preparation. But the hoped-for refixing of the match didn't happen even though the players involved with both the football and hurling panels returned to county training earlier this week.

Instead the county board statement acknowledged, "there is an issue within Laois and all other counties between local championship and intercounty fixtures" and that "there is merit in some of the points raised by Portlaoise".

It continued by undertaking that the board "will endeavour to the best of their ability to give clubs adequate time to prepare for local championship games with particular emphasis on allowing clubs 13 days' preparation after Laois teams exit their respective championships. However Laois CLG will continue to facilitate our senior panels with 13 days' preparation prior to their championship proper."

Dowling accepted the club hadn't got anything tangible in return for its protest.

"Not a lot. But other clubs in the county and nationally have thanked us for highlighting this issue. Realistically we were never going to get the points back but we never wanted it to come to this.

"We never wanted to take on the county board and there was no way of appealing the decision but it was the only way of highlighting what clubs are having to put up with. All we wanted was fair play."

The county executive statement was couched in a conciliatory tone, stating it "understands the plight of players in the club versus county scenario and has particular sympathy for dual players and clubs" and would "adhere as far as possible to the local fixture schedule outlined at the beginning of the year."