GAA Hurling 2014

Ya, we have the worst 2 county grounds in the country, there is little argument from anyone there. They have done away with the grass bank in Corkery's picture & also the grass bank behind the 'country' end, so now Walsh Park theoretically holds 17,000. Now, I'm no safety officer, but assuming you could get that many in there, there isn't a hope in hell you would get them out again in a rush if ya had to, 3 of the 4 entrances are on one side of the ground (behind main stand) for starters, and as Heff mentioned, there is absolutely nowhere to park anywhere near the ground for that volume of people. 

I don't think championship games are ever going to be a runner there anyway, even assuming the 17k figure to be correct, only 3500 of that is seated, it simply isn't enough to cater for the demands that would be on such a game. 

There were plans to build a proper stadium (shared with WIT campus) of 25k on a new site back in '07 (when Walsh Park would have been worth big money for development purposes) but mainly due to the politics of the everlasting East/West split in our county board, that never got off the ground. Link to what might have been here.......http://www.munster-express.ie/local-news/cullen-gives-details-of-e20m-gaa-stadiumby-years-end/

The reality is as Corkery said though, we don't need more stadia in this country, even had that been built , it would be full once or twice a year, but the heavily indebted CB have lost out on the alternative revenue the likes of last yr's Bruce Springsteen concerts brought to Cork and KK, as well as not getting big gate reciepts that those 1 or 2 games a year would bring. Nobody to blame here other than themselves, this isn't hindsight, as the link above proves, the early plans were in place but vetoed by the parish pump politics so beloved of the GAA and this country in general. 

 

 

Brilliant, was sure it would have been Parnell. Far handier.

 

Loughgiel certainly would go in favourites. A Dunloy man (local, rather bitter rivals ) reckons Loughgiel by 8. Having watched them through Ulster I wouldn't just be as confident. Going OK in challenge matches, beat DCU and UCD but beat by Dublin Co team 3-17 to 0-15.

 

id actually fancy Na Piarsaigh to win this out, they seem to be the best balanced team left in the competition - I presume that bag of crazy Liam Watson is still playing AM?