Leitrim manager Steven Poacher has came out swinging against accusations that he was solely to blame for his team not fielding against Fermanagh last weekend.
The Down native is currently managing Leitrim, and last week they made the unprecedented decision to concede their upcoming Division Three game against Fermanagh because of player welfare.
The squad was decimated with injuries, and because they relied so heavily on their U20 players, the fact that the U20 championship started a couple of days after the league game, meant that they only had 13 fit and able players available for selection.
Speaking on Newstalk, Poacher claims that the decision to withdraw from the game was not made by him.
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“It came about late on Friday. The decision that was made, was the U20’s wouldn’t be available.
“For me it’s really straight forward. I didn’t really have a decision to make, I’m the manager of the team. I’m not in charge of the county as a whole.
“There’s a number of stakeholders in this. There’s an Under-20 management as well, there’s a senior management, there’s the county board. There’s a medical staff”.
“There’s a huge array of people who are involved in this and I’ve been pretty generous with my time to come out and try and speak about it and try and shed some light on it.
“We prepared Wednesday night without them. They (U20) were playing a challenge game against Dublin. We were good enough in the free week to release them for 10 days with the U20 squad.
“It’s important to remember, that you have an U20 championship were this group feel they can possibly win Connacht. We’re trying to give them the best possible opportunity to do that”.
Poacher then made the point that there had been a culture problem in the county, and that poor decision by previous management teams is what has caused this.
The Mayobridge clubman believes that they should have a smaller, but elite group of players, in order to keep the standards high, but that those in charge in the past allowed players to come on board, even if they didn't have the necessary quality of attitude.
“For years and years, for counties like Leitrim, sub-standard behaviours have been accepted and this is, with all due respect, to previous management teams.
“But maybe because you stood on a bank and watched a club game with a former manager and was pally, pally. That was good enough for you to slip or to get away x, y and z”.
“I’m only using that tongue and cheek, that’s not what happened.
“But what I’m saying is, we need to change the culture and standard. The players want to change the culture and standards.
“Last weekend was obviously disappointing for everyone of course it was. The reason we carry a smaller panel is because some players can’t live to those standards and cultures that we are trying to achieve in Leitrim”.
The counter argument to conceding the game was that the county have 24 Gaelic football clubs, and they could have called some players to join the panel, even if it was only for one game.
Of course this means that they might lose the match, but the point about fixture congestion and injuries would have still been made without questioning the integrity of the competition or putting Leitrim in this media storm.
