THE KILDARE SENIOR Football panel have slammed their county board for sacking manager Kieran McGeeney and stated their wishes to have the Armagh man reinstated.
The players released a statement through Kildare radio station KFM this evening that conveyed their extreme frustration and disappoointment about McGeeney’s culling as county boss. Following six years in charge of the Lilywhite’s, McGeeney lost a county delegates ballot by one vote [29 to 28] and was out of a job.
The statement read, “[The panel] wishes to express its extreme frustration and disappointment at the sacking of our manager Kieran McGeeney on Tuesday night, ending a six-year term that brought Kildare from rank outsiders to a consistent top 8 team in the country.
“The players feel that our County Board has let us down greatly throughout this process and our manager has been treated with a complete lack of respect and loyalty following his six years at the helm. Kieran’s reputation was frequently impugned at times by comments made over the past few weeks.” The statement continued:
Our ultimate wish is that last Tuesday night’s decision is overturned and that negotiations are immediately opened with Kieran McGeeney to reinstate him and his management team for 2014. Tuesday’s decision and the process followed has left us angered and we will be submitting our recommendations to the County Board in the next two weeks on how this process should be structured in the future. We expect a fair consultation process will be conducted with all parties. We don’t believe that this is unprecedented nor do we think it is unreasonable.”
The playing panel said it did not want to disrespect the Kildare clubs, who are ‘the heartbeat of the GAA’, but accused many delegates of ousting McGeeney to suit ‘club or personal agendas best’.
Kildare were heavily beaten by Dublin in the Leinster SFC this year and were defeated in Newbridge my Mickey Harte’s Tyrone.
The statement concluded with some words of thanks to McGeeney and his backroom staff and a tribute to turning the county’s fortunes around. It read, “He transformed us from also-rans to challengers on a yearly basis.”
