Pitch upgrade high on Kilbeggan chairman's agenda
April 30, 2010While he would gladly welcome any kind of silverware this year, Kilbeggan's new chairman Ken Scally would be just as happy if he could achieve his main objective which is to improve the playing surface at St. James' Park.
The Clara Road pitch has taken a lot of punishment over the years and is desperately in need of an upgrade according to the 32-year-old company director, who has succeeded Mal Keenan in the chair.
"Getting the pitch right will be my priority for this year," he says.
"It hasn't been in great condition for the last few years, but we are taking steps to putting that right. We moved training to the Mercy Secondary School's pitch on the Dublin Road for the first couple of months of this year in order to give the pitch a chance to recover. We hope to carry out improvements on it as the year goes on and make it one of the best around.
"We are trying to secure land which we can use as a training pitch. If this comes to pass, the existing pitch will be used only for games. We also have plans to install training floodlights in the near future. The principal of Mercy Secondary School, Garrett Farrell, has been very helpful to us but we shouldn't have to be relying on him to provide us with training facilities."
Ken, who plays for the club's junior team and is a brother of intermediate team full back Fergal, is also targeting success on the playing side of things and feels the Brosnasiders should be aiming for an intermediate championship semi-final place at the very least.
"It's 10 years since we won it so success is long overdue. We've lost a few key players in recent years, but there is great work being done at underage level and that bodes well for the future. Donal Fox is chairman of the Kilbeggan/St. Joseph's underage club and is putting in a huge amount of work with the youngsters. We're hoping to get some of those youngsters through in the next couple of years and to get bigger turnouts at training.
"Even though we haven't been at our best in the last few years, we have been capable of beating anyone in the intermediate championship on any given day. We just have to try and get some consistency in our game."
2009 certainly wasn't one of Kilbeggan's better years. Apart from failing to reach the knockout stages of the championship, they were also relegated to Division 3 of the All-County League.
"We'd usually make the quarter-finals or semi-finals, but last year we didn't even get out of the group which was very disappointing," the chairman ruefully reflects.
"Nigel Dunne from Rahan was our manager and I suppose things didn't go right for him. We had a great win over Ballynacargy, who have reached the last two intermediate finals, but there wasn't much else to get excited about. It was a poor year and we just have to move on from it."
The tone for the year was set when the Shamrocks lost their championship opener to newly-promoted St. Mary's by 0-8 to 1-8. However, Nigel Dunne's charges bounced back to beat Ballynacargy by 2-14 to 2-8 in what could only be described as a massive upset. After all, it had been less than six months since Bal' hammered Kilbeggan by 24 points in the 2008 quarter-final.
The maroon and whites recovered from a 0-3 to 0-8 interval deficit to edge out Moate All-Whites by 1-7 to 0-9 in their third outing. A place in the knockout stages was now well within their grasp, but they let it slip with defeats to Milltownpass and Tang in their remaining group matches. The manner of the 1-7 to 1-17 loss to Tang left Kilbeggan with much soul-searching to do over the winter months, but Ken insists that the players have gotten over that particular disappointment and are ready to give their all for new manager Philip Kiernan. A former Longford midfielder, Philip played out the final years of his long career with the Shamrocks and is no stranger to the manager's role, though when he was last at the helm, he was still playing.
"Philip has a lot of experience in the game and he knows the strengths and weaknesses of every player in the club. He has brought in Paul Daly and Mick Egan as selectors and they'll be hoping for a big improvement on last year."
At their AGM last January, Kilbeggan also elected an equally youthful new secretary in Emma Pidgeon. Ken explains: "Emma has replaced Niall Maxwell, but Noel Collins is staying on as treasurer. I would like to take this opportunity to thank both Mal Keenan and Niall Maxwell for their efforts over the past few years, and the rest of the committee for that matter. Mal is still on the committee and is responsible for the upkeep of the pitch."
"I would also like to express our gratitude to our sponsors McGee Fuels and EVM, which are owned by John and Danny McGee respectively. Danny has shown tremendous loyalty to the club down the years and we are delighted that he is continuing as one of our two main sponsors."
At the recent commemoration event held in Locke's Distillery to honour Kilbeggan's 1959 junior football and hurling championship winning teams, the word 'pride' was mentioned more than once. Needless to say, Ken - who is managing director ofo Scally Precast Products in Athyconnor - is hoping the players who don the maroon and white jersey in 2010 will show they have this vital quality in abundance. Tweet
