1 day Ago By [email protected] (Karl O'Kane)
Carlow skipper Mikey Bambrick says dealing with the circumstances around Shane Curran’s resignation as manager is a “baptism of fire” for him as Joe Murphy was unveiled as interim boss. Bambrick also revealed that there has been "some build up of frustration" over the last few weeks. The team captain says that some of the players who left the squad this year have now returned and that Carlow are looking forward to getting down to work with former county player Murphy.
Carlow face Meath this weekend at Pairc Tailteann in the opening round of the Leinster Championship. The Carlow players released a statement last Friday questioning Curran’s set-up and outlining “persistent concerns with the overall organisation and training environment," after a County Board statement said the manager had resigned due to “player related issues.’ “A lot of people in the county are looking to help out and they're coming in doing great training sessions with us,” said Bambrick.
“(We’re) still getting good preparation for the first round of the championship.” Bambrick jokes that he could have done with Darragh Foley staying on as captain for another year. “It's a baptism of fire,” he said.
“I'm not used to dealing with all this stuff either. It just means all the players have that bit more added responsibility to get themselves right. “At the end of the day, you're still going out and training.
You're still going out and getting yourself right and ready for the Championship. “Not much has changed but it's just a bit more added pressure and responsibility on a lot of players. “There's been some build up of frustration, I suppose is the way of putting it over the last few weeks.
“When this happened, I don't know what the words are, but we've come more together as a group and we've had lads that have stepped away come back in. “That's always a good sign when you have more of the best players in your county playing. “Trainings are better - upbeat, good intensity training.
Just looking forward to the week now and weeks and months going ahead for the season.” Speaking about the player statement, Bambrick added: “I suppose with what came out afterwards, the kind of statements and the opinions that were floating around with people, we as players never wanted to go out and do any interviews or say any of that sort of stuff, but we just felt obliged. “It wasn't for the national view of us.
It was for the people in Carlow because lads come up to me and ask me what's the story with what went on. “We just want to get the truth and the facts out there of what happened for us as players, because when things like that are getting discussed, it's not fair on us at the time. “We just wanted to get that out there and get that clear.
We didn't want to make it anything direct. “We didn't want to make any accusation like that. We just wanted to get our side out so everyone knew what was going on.
” Bambrick continued: “The GPA were a great help. They saw what was going on and they reached out to us. 100percent they were a great help in how to go about putting something (a statement) together.
“At the end of the day we wanted it just for Carlow, so that statement only went out to the Carlow news stations and reporters and we would have been happy if it stayed there and had not gone nationally. “We just wanted to get our side of the story out. I'm looking forward to going back to playing football now to be honest.
“You can only do so much talking. At the end of the day you're a footballer and all you want to do is go out and train and try to improve and do what you can on the pitch.” To keep up to date with all the latest GAA news, sign-up to our GAA newsletter here.
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