The path to progress

WHEN Joe MeDonagh was elected president of the GAA in London last year, his acceptance speech made reference to the Coiste Iomana and the fact that he, like many of his generation, would regard himself as a "Coiste kid", in recognition of the ground-breaking committee that revitalised hurling in Galway.

It had been the brainchild of then GAA president Alf Murray who established the Coiste at national level and encouraged counties to set up their own. Nowhere was the concept more enthusiastically embraced than in Galway.

The success of the initiative can be seen in the extent to which Galway have emerged as a force in the modern game, particularly at under-age level. The follow-through at senior level has at times been disappointing - "You couldn't keep them supplied with players," according to one caustic view of the senior end of the conveyor belt - but the under-age structures in the county are the envy of the rest of the country.

From the foundation of the Coiste Iomana in the mid-1960s, the county began to overhaul its hurling structures. Galway had been part of Munster for championship purposes during the 1960s and that experiment was abandoned.

The first signs of life came with the progress to the 1970 All-Ireland minor final when they were well beaten by Cork. Nonetheless, the foundations had been laid and within two years many of the same players had returned to claim the county's first All-Ireland under-21 title. In the interim, the county had established a hurling board on the initiative of Gerry Cloherty.

Most of the work was done by schools and clubs with institutional support from the board. Coaching schemes were put in place and training sessions organised in Spiddal. The foundation of Cumann na mBunscoil helped to establish an effective programme of national schools' activities.

Resources were spent on infrastructure and as a result, the south of the county where hurling holds sway, can boast a string of club grounds better equipped than many county venues. The appeal of under-age hurling in the county is huge with crowds of 6,000 attending under-16 finals.

The arrival of the county as an All-Ireland force in the 1980s helped bring a hoard of under-age trophies in its wake. Most impressively, the vocational schools inter-county All-Ireland has gone to Galway 12 times since 1980, although this rate of acquisition is expected to slow down.

For a long time, Galway had more vocational schools than most other counties, but in recent years a couple of leading schools, Portumna and Gort, have switched to community school status and enter the colleges' championship rather than the vocational schools.

At under-age championship levels, only Kilkenny at minor have a better record that Galway who are fancied to retain their under-21 crown later this summer.