Living in Portlaoise.
Nothing surprises me at all. Except it’s taken this long.
Did he ever pick up a hurl for his club?
Yea I think he played till minor. Was no good though.
Married in Laois and moved up there. He hurled till U-21 with the Arravale. Actually played in goals for the Abbey when they won the all Ireland b schools title in 02. He didn’t concede a goal in the whole championship until he dropped one in in injury time.
I was involved with a team that had him last year in a final. I must given a 5 min speech about him beforehand. As Murphy’s law would go actually had a fine game and all the lads after were wondering what my problem was with him.
He’s slowly improving but from a very low base. I’ve no doubt he will find himself in controversy in the future again.
First round of the Leinster IFC today, Two Mile House of Kildare were playing Shandonagh of Westmeath. TMH were a point up in injury time and their goalie kicks a ball away to waste a few seconds, and gets a yellow card. Ref asks for his name and he gives it, Didier Cordonnier. The ref tells him to stop taking the piss and tells him to spell his name. Didier starts to spell it, the ref loses the rag and gives him a second yellow for dissent!
TMH have notions of going to Paddy’s Day - their manager at least?
Hi Ewan.
DENIS WALSH
october 28 2018, 12:01am, the sunday times
Camross continue violent streak
denis walsh
Club have dragged Laois hurling into the gutter again but there seems little appetite to do anything about them
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In the days after the poisonous Laois county hurling final two photographs from the Camross celebrations emerged on social media. In one of them a Camross player is wearing a hard hat and protective goggles with a hurley held across his chest in heroic pose. The caption on the post reads: “Tooth fairy does what he likes when he likes.”
The other photograph, posted a day later, included the same player with two of his teammates sitting at a bar counter grinning with exaggerated smiles so that you can’t miss their perfect teeth. To grasp the tasteless and provocative nature of the photographs you need to understand the context. In the county final Ross King, a Rathdowney-Errill player, had his mouth smashed by the butt of a hurley. The alleged aggressor appeared in both photographs, although there is no suggestion that he wrote the caption.
In a long, lucid and powerful interview in The Times, Ireland edition on Thursday King gave what amounted to a victim impact statement. Two of his teeth are dead and ongoing dental work will cost about €5,000. For more than two weeks he lived on a diet of protein shakes, mashed banana, porridge and scrambled eggs while his mouth slowly recovered; in the process he lost nearly a stone in weight. He couldn’t return to work for more than a week and has missed other days since then for dental appointments.
Club shame: Ross King had his mouth smashed by the butt of a hurley during the Laois county hurling final
“I physically couldn’t speak,” King said to Shane Keegan, The Times columnist and a close friend of King’s. “My lips were kind of stuck together. I had no appetite, no energy and just no interest in anything.”
As captain of the Laois senior team King is a well-known and well-liked figure in Laois GAA and he was touched by the amount of support he received from friends and strangers alike. “One girl sent me a medal to keep me safe,” said King. “Beautiful gestures. But you still can’t help feeling low and you are drained mentally. I’m over a lot of the physical side but the mental side I don’t feel anywhere near over it. I don’t feel that justice has been served after all that’s gone on. It’s just insulting.”
The incident happened as part of a greater melee after which a couple of players were booked but nobody was sent off. Darrell Dooley, the Camross player who struck King, was yellow-carded for another offence in the melee but not for hitting King. When the referee confirmed this to the Laois county board they were at liberty to investigate the King incident; the outcome was a proposed two-match suspension.
Dooley took his case to the Laois Hearings Committee and at the beginning of the week they threw out the proposed suspensions reportedly on the grounds that the video evidence was inconclusive, although no formal statement was issued. A slow motion video of the melee is easy to find on various websites, including Laois Today whose coverage of this story has been comprehensive from the start. You can judge for yourself.
The irony is that Dooley should have been red-carded for wild pulling in the melee, quite apart from the incident with King. He was also involved in a massive flare-up in the semi-final against Borris-Kilcotton in which at least four Camross players should have been sent off, including Dooley. On that occasion nobody was red-carded and the Laois county board failed to hold an investigation afterwards. Video footage of that incident has also been circulated widely on social media.
In the greater debate on violence in the GAA, especially at club level, Camross are an interesting example. When a violent incident occurs there is always a clamour for decisive action and appropriate punishments but how often are consequences equated with solutions? What does punishment achieve without reform?
Look at Camross’ case history. In 1986 they played Clara from Kilkenny in the Leinster club championship, a game that became known as The Battle of Athy. Both clubs were suspended from the Leinster club championship for five years although this was reduced on appeal to three; the upshot was that Camross missed one provincial campaign.
Just three years later two Camross players were given life suspensions, later commuted to two years. One of them returned to captain Camross to win a county title. Seven years after that, in 1996, a county final between Camross and Portlaoise concluded with a free-for-all between supporters of both teams who climbed the wire to enter the field.
In 2005 a county final between Camross and Castletown was blighted by a 15-year-old Camross player being stretchered off the field, apparently unconscious and resulted in suspensions of 48 weeks and 24 weeks for two Camross players — including the stricken boy — and suspensions of 96 weeks and 72 weeks for a Castletown player and water carrier.
When the teams met again a year later two players were sent off, igniting a brawl that involved up to 20 men, including supporters; Garda intervention was needed to restore order. A Camross player and a supporter were both given two year suspensions, the clubs were fined €5,000 each and initially banned from the following year’s championship. After they exhausted the appeals process, including a pitch to the Disputes Resolutions Authority, they appealed for clemency again to the Laois executive.
Independent mediation between the clubs was arranged, the fines were paid, apologies were issued, a joint golf classic was organised in the interests of harmony and the ban was essentially reduced to a suspended sentence. “We’ve also agreed,” said Kieran Delaney, the Camross chairman at the time, “should someone step out of line, they’re on their own. We won’t represent them.”
Has the culture in Camross changed? After they lost to Mount Leinster Rangers in the Leinster club championship last year four of their players were suspended, one of them for two years. Three of those suspensions arose from their behaviour towards match officials.
There may not be a club in the GAA which has attracted more sanctions than Camross and yet bad behaviour has haunted them from one generation to the next. Dooley should have been suspended for his strike on King; Camross should have been hauled over the coals for their part in the semi-final melee. Instead they have dragged Laois club hurling into the gutter again. The Laois county board have been weak and they must carry their share of responsibility.
But without cultural change, nothing changes. Have Camross tackled any of their players about their behaviour in recent weeks? The club secretary was unavailable for comment yesterday.
The fact that the Club didn’t have the decency to check after King says all you need.
The appealing of the suspension showed the neck of the cunts. I hope they get their holes opened.
What games are on Telly today?
Trampish behaviour.
Kilkenny final
Source for the video of the semi final mêlée?
/original/3X/b/3/b3b356e496449f94f04c8a31474023a39ee08c90.MP4
What’s the deal with club players advertising businesses other than their club sponsor on their gear? Especially in a live televised game?
No one got suspensions with that? The chap on the far left struck, then ripped off the helmet, then threw a dunt of a hurl at the lad on the ground. 3 cases for one player. And a heap more again if you look at the rest. As the article says, laois county board have as much to answer for if they keep letting that shit off