Beara frustrated over withdrawal from championship: 'Players have passed up the chance to play senior football'

Beara GAA secretary Joseph Blake has said it’s time to play the Divisional/Colleges section of the Cork Premier SFC in April from next year onwards.

His comments to The Echo comes on the back of the news that Beara had pulled out on Wednesday, a day before their opening round game against Duhallow.

For the third successive season, Beara will not be competing in the Cork Premier SFC.

They notified the Cork County Board that they didn’t have enough players to field after late withdrawals. 

Blake, a former PRO of the Cork County Board, has expressed his disappointment.

“It’s something that we were hoping to avoid,” he says on Beara’s exit from this year’s championship.

“I know the difficulties that the CCC face. I sat on the board for a few years and I know the people involved. From a Beara point of view in our meetings, we highlighted that April may be the best time to play the divisional/colleges section.

“Once you go into May and June time, you have the Junior B football championship, county league fixtures and also players will go away on holidays. We could see at the start of the year that June time was going to be problematic for Beara.

“We made the effort though and up until Wednesday lunchtime, we were going to have a team. Unfortunately, a couple of lads pulled out and then we just didn’t have enough numbers.

“It’s disappointing. In Cork, regardless of your status, you get the opportunity to play in the top-tier championship. That’s what players should be aspiring to do, to play above their grade. Players aren’t taking the opportunity to play in the Premier Senior grade.

“Players and managers need to realise that you get better with playing with better footballers and also playing against better footballers. That’s the disappointment from my point of view.

“There is more structure now with the league and the championship. I am totally in favour of it. But, I do think we need to look at the league programme. I know how difficult a job the CCC have in terms of fixtures. I know that first hand. 

"If Kevin O’Donovan, Noel O’Callaghan or Pat Horgan rang me tomorrow and asked what could we do, I would say to create a window in April. June doesn’t work.”

Beara now haven’t fielded a team in the Cork Premier SFC since 2022, so what does the future hold for a division with six top-flight football championship titles to their name on Leeside?

“My term as secretary of Beara comes to an end later this year, but I will pass my thoughts on to the next person. The fact of the matter is that we haven’t fielded since 2022. We had around 37 lads togged out that year. It was brilliant.

“We had only two clubs, Adrigole and Castletownbere, who put forward players for this year’s Beara team. That’s a shame. Players will be retired for long enough, you should take up the opportunity of playing senior football.

“In terms of next year, that’s for other people to sort out.”