All-Ireland champions Carnacon banished in shock Mayo GAA move
REIGNING All-Ireland ladies senior club champions Carnacon have been dumped out of the 2018 Mayo senior club championship by the Mayo Ladies County Board over some of their club's players pulling away from the county senior panel last month.
As a result of this decision by the Mayo County Board, Carnacon will be unable to defend their county senior, Connaught and All-Ireland titles this year.
The decision by the Mayo County Board, which was made at meeting last night (Tuesday), has already sent shock waves throughout the county and national ladies Gaelic football as a whole.
According to one source who attended last night's county board meeting, the decision to throw the Carnacon senior team out was made under rule 288 which relates to bringing the game into disrepute during the saga over some of their team members withdrawing for the county senior panel last month.
The problems with a number of the players and the county senior management first came to light after the Connaught final between Mayo and Galway in June.
As a result, 12 members of the panel and two selectors, Michael McHale and Denise McDonagh, left 10 days before Mayo's qualifier against Cavan. Eight of the players were from the Carnacon club.
The reasons given by the players was that they had player welfare issues and personnel reasons were also cited.
After some dicussions it was agreed by all parties that the best way to try and resolve the issues was by mediation.
At the time a statement by the Mayo County Board secretary said that, having listened to all parties involved, there was a lot of sadness and hurt.
However, it now seems that it is just the Carnacon players who have been singled out by the county board as the other players from other clubs, including team captain Sarah Tierney, who withdrew from the county senior panel along with the Carnacon players, were not sanctioned.
When The Connaught Telegraph contacted the Carnacon secretary Beatrice Casey today, she said that they had not received any official confirmation regarding been thrown out of the senior county championship.
However, she did confirm that they had a club delegate at last night's county board meeting and that a vote was taken and passed to remove the club from both the Mayo senior championship and league for the remainder of the season.
“We have not got any official confirmation from the Mayo County Board yet regarding last night's meeting. However, we had a delegate at the meeting and a vote was passed under rule 288 to remove us from the Mayo senior championship and senior league for the remainder of the season.
“I can't make any further comment until we get official notice from the Mayo County Board,” said Beatrice.
It would seen from the outset that this decision by the Mayo County Board last night to throw Carnacon out of the Mayo league and championship could have a far reaching effect on the future of Mayo ladies Gaelic football.