OFFALY GAA HAVE announced that hurling boss Kevin Martin and his management team have been replaced with immediate effect after back-to-back opening defeats in the Joe McDonagh Cup.
After suffering relegation from the Liam MacCarthy Cup last year and from Division 1 in the Allianz League in 2019, the Faithful are in danger of dropping again — this time to the hurling championship’s third tier — after defeats to Laois and Westmeath.
Another two-time All-Ireland winning Offaly player replaces Martin, with Joachim Kelly coming in on an interim basis.
Kelly formerly guided the county’s camogie side to All-Ireland success and led Coolderry to the Leinster SHC semi-final last year.
Offaly GAA confirmed the changes this evening:
“Following on from an Offaly GAA Management Committee meeting tonight, Kevin Martin & his Management Team have been replaced as the current Senior Hurling Management with immediate effect,” a statement reads.
“The committee would like to thank Kevin and his team for their commitment and effort over the last 2 years.
“Survival in the Joe McDonagh Cup competition in 2019 is essential for the long term development of hurling in the county.
“To this end Joachim Kelly has been appointed by the management committee as interim manager to the end of this year’s Joe McDonagh Cup competition. We wish Joachim and his team the best of luck in the upcoming games.”
There were 13 points in the difference as Westmeath beat Offaly on Saturday and from there, Martin really came under fire.
Kelly now takes the reins and with two games to save their McDonagh Cup status and avoid another major setback, they welcome Antrim to Tullamore on Saturday in a must-win fixture.
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Offaly remind me of a small country club. Every now and again they unearth absolute gems of hurlers, they go on a successful run win the county final then that crop of players get older and they drop back down to junior. It’s just a fact of life in the GAA only a hand full of clubs and counties can sustain continued success.
But a word of warning for Offaly, once you go down junior it’s a very long road back!!!
Let’s not give the players a hard time, they’re doing all they can for very little thanks or reward.
Offaly County Board are an absolute joke# Reap what you sow
So sad to see what has been happening both hurling & football in Offaly over the last decade or so. A county that you could never write off in the past. I might be way off, but I think part of the problem was, that when all the big name players were coming to retirement there wasn’t many coming through to replace them. Not enough work was put into under age teams, couple that with a county board that always interfered, didn’t let managers do their job it’s a recipe for disaster. Although Offaly are not at the level for all Ireland championship at the moment, I don’t think any team should be relegated. The competition should be for every county to participate in but the bigwigs in the GAA see it otherwise. Hope it’s not too long before we see great Offaly teams again.
@Declan Moran: do you think the Donegal hurlers should compete in the same competition as the Kilkenny hurlers for example. Can’t see who the benefits. Listen the the interview with hurlers from Roscommon, Leitrim and Cavan I think on Newstalk on Saturday. These are the guys at the coal face and totally agree with the different grades.
Look at Carlow so far, doing better than Offaly the last few years!
I don’t what’s going here but Offaly
Were always a great county team both hurling and football team .
@Kevin: they actually weren’t .. they had a golden crop from 80s to 90s little or nothing before or after . Btw I say that as someone who loved their style of hurling at that time and sorry to see their demise at the minute as any hurling fan I know is.
Offaly are absolute mess. Disgraceful stuff.
Panic stations…
Just wondering if any other team other than westmeath beat offaly would there be such a hullabaloo Kevin Martin is an honourable proud offaly man who tried to do his best but when you have players not committing what chance did he have I bet there will be a few more coolderry players in now and what about the shinrone players pulling away rumour has it their trainer told them offaly or win a championship if that’s true both the Secretary and chairman are totally wrong to allow it
I’m not from offaly or do I care about them it was great to see our lads preform so well last Saturday but fair is fair
@PW: your wrong on the Coolderry comment. No Coolderry player refused to go in with Offaly this year.
@PW: Pretty sure all Coolderry players asked to go in with offaly this year answered the call….with a number let go then prior to the league/cship. A little more research needed before you make that bet I’d advise.
Sniper – only one county can win a contest. The fate of most teams is to lose