After their final game of Division One, the Armagh ladies footballers sit level on points with Cork, Dublin and Kerry.
At the weekend, they played a rescheduled fixture against Cork. The playing of that game itself was somewhat of a shambles. It was originally slated for April 9th. However, due to weather conditions, the game was cancelled. Just a day previous, Armagh management requested confirmation that a Plan B was in place should the Eire Og pitch not be playable. They were told to travel regardless. According to The Belfast Telegraph, the cancellation of that game and it not being played on the originally scheduled date cost Armagh €4,000.
On Sunday, the Armagh ladies team were further disrespected.
Following the game against Cork, which Armagh lost by three points, they were told by the Ladies Gaelic Football Association that they had qualified for the Division One semi-finals.
That turned out to be incorrect - it was Kerry who had qualified for the final four. Armagh were informed of the mistake by phone call.
Apologies to @Armaghladiesga1 supporters for incorrect incorrect tweet earlier.
— Ladies Football (@LadiesFootball) April 17, 2016
Last night on Facebook, Armagh management - led by 2002 All-Ireland winner Ronan Clarke - released a strong statement.
In it, they decry the 'incompetence' of the LGFA for their treatment over the last two weeks.
We have decided as a team not to pursue the injustice and total disregard today regarding our treatment by the total incompetence of the LGFA in their decision of initially and officially informing our team we had qualified for a Div 1 league semi final for the first time in the history of Armagh ladies football to be then told via phone call that we had not qualified - our team have been treated very poorly over the past 2 weekends by a so called official association - we would like to thank the Armagh ladies County Board in particular our Chairman Owen Reel who had offered to fight a legal case on our behalf.
We feel as a team involved in a sport that we see other associations and players fighting for equality and recognition that what happened today puts our sport in jeopardy as we constantly strive to improve support and finances to build the sport we are involved in.
We will however do what we can in our power to see that this does not happen any other county in the future by fighting for change in the rules and regulations.
We wish the remaining four counties in our division Cork, Mayo, Dublin and Kerry all the best in their league semi finals.
Picture credit: Oliver McVeigh / SPORTSFILE
