Secretary's Address to Club AGM - 21 November 2021
Unfortunately 2021 started off as 2020 finished - in lockdown and our games were unable to return until April 29th. Again, Covid regulations brought about many challenges for the club, managers, coaches, players and parents but thankfully with full cooperation from everyone, the year ran as smoothly as it possibly could.
Fundraising - Covid meant we were yet again restricted as to how we could fundraise during the year; however, we started the year with the Coast-to-Coast challenge and thanks must go to Philip Mc Loone, Sarah Daly and William for their work on this. It was a great success with members, non-members, young, old taking part and reaching people from our starting point in Creevy to overseas in Toronto and Syria! Thank you also to all the subcommittees for their fundraising efforts throughout the year.
Sponsors - many thanks to all the businesses / people who sponsored teams and made donations throughout 2021. We are aware that it was another tough year for businesses, and we appreciate all the sponsorship/donations made to the club. I would like to encourage all our members to shop local and in return support the businesses that support us throughout the year.
Lotto - Covid-19 continued to have an affect on how the lotto was ran during 2021 and I am very grateful to all the subcommittees for not only getting their slots filled but for also recording the draw on a weekly basis. The lotto is our only source of weekly income and the club depend on all sub committees to support and promote the lotto. Thank you to Gerard & Catherine for their help with the lotto every Sunday evening.
Park Committee - Firstly a huge thank you must go the Park Committee, in particular Tom & David for their work in being to accommodate all training sessions and games this year. With every team returning to training at the same time, it was not an easy task to sit and fit all 25 teams into a weekly schedule for training. The time and effort put into this was very much appreciated.
Secondly, for anyone that has been in Fr.Tierney Park recently, they would have seen the vast amount of work that has gone on over the last few months. It was absolutely brilliant to finally get the pitch development underway. The Sponsor-A-Sod campaign has so far been very successful and huge credit to Tom, David and Michael Daly for the work they continue to put into this fundraiser. I urge all of you that have yet to sponsor a sod to please do so as soon as possible.
Club Gear - again this year Chris Kelly approached us with club gear and again it proved to be very successful. Chris puts in hours of work to ensure that the gear is top quality and that all orders are fulfilled, so a massive thank you to Chris for his work on this.
Thanks must now go to all managers and coaches across all codes and age groups. Again this was another season that brought about Covid regulations and full cooperation was got from you all throughout the year. I also thank you all for your time, dedication and work with teams.
Bord na nOg - where there may not have been silverware at Bord na nOg level, it is very evident that a huge amount of work is going on behind the scenes and this is largely down to the work of Oige Aoidh Ruaidh. Numbers at the younger age groups are phenomenal and this is a credit to the number of coached involved. The aim for Bord na nOg is to have a plan that retains these numbers throughout the older age groups and in turn develop players who will go on and play senior football for our club.
Juvenile Hurlers - Congratulations to John Larkin on a very successful first year as Chairperson. I attended a few of the Sunday morning training sessions and it was great to see the numbers at U5 - U9 age groups. Congratulations must also go to both the U13 & U17 management & teams on winning their respective leagues and Championship.
Ladies - Congratulations to both Sarah Daly and Louise Larkin on a fantastic first year as Chairperson and secretary. It was an absolute credit to the committee, management and players that Aodh Ruadh were able to field 2 senior teams this year. Congratulations also to the U16 management and team on winning their County Final!
Senior Hurling -Throughout the season this team faced a number of challenges with regards fixtures and obstacles from the CCC but the small, dedicated panel played some great hurling and in doing so reached the Junior Championship Final. Unfortunately it wasn't to be on the day but credit to the team and management for their commitment throughout the season.
Reserve Football - 2021 was a mixed season for the reserve panel. With the league going good, the Championship proved to me more difficult. It was disappointing to have to email the CCC to say we couldn't field for one of our Championship games. I thank the players that did commit to the season, however at times it was hard work for management to get players to commit to games on a weekly basis. I feel that whilst there was some work put in to improve the reserve set up, that a lot more work needs to go in for 2022. Thank you to Peter and Gerry for their work and commitment to this panel.
Senior Football - Congratulations to Barry and the senior team on winning Division 2 and being promoted to Division 1 for 2022. It is a huge credit to the work that was put into this team that winning the league came with only one loss. As with the senior hurlers, this team had to overcome obstacles from the CCC and had games changed about on numerous occasions. This is very unfair to a panel of players, and I would hope that given that we outlined our concerns on more than one occasion to the CCC, that the same does not happen going forward. Being back in Senior Championship definitely came with an air of excitement and again these players played some of their best football and it is no mean feat to reach a quarter final in our first year back at Senior Championship level. Thank you to the players, Barry, Aran, Gregory, Ronan, John & Cian for your hard work and commitment throughout the season.
Covid Officers - When the Covid officer regulation was brought in in 2020, I think we all naively thought it would be for a few weeks and it would go back to normal again and little did we know that it would not only remain for 2020 but also be a requirement to enable the 2021 season to proceed and without the dedication of the following people, our training and games would not have been able to go ahead - Ivan O'Mahony, Michelle Gillespie, Sharon Reynolds, Michael Mc Grath, Mark Sheerin, David O'Donnell, Mairead Sheridan, Susan Lynch, Paul Sheridan, Linda Clyne, Sinead Keown, Geraldine Rogers, Leah O'Brien, Orlaith Gillespie, Josephine Mc Nulty, Elaine Garvey, Louise Larkin, the U16 management & Barry O'Neill. Many thanks to you all for taking on this role and ensuring all players had completed their return to play before every training session and game, your commitment to this was very much appreciated.
Thank you to John Hughes who puts in a huge amount of work with regards social media and our club notes. The website this year seen a lot of activity and thank you to Brian Drummond who seemed to attend every single game and capture some fantastic photographs.
Finally, a massive thank you to William and Sabrina. They both help make this role an absolute pleasure to do.
Overall it has been a very successful year for Aodh Ruadh and that is down to the hard work of all the people involved at any level and again 2021 proved that working together as one, we can only become stronger as a club.
Take care and stay safe!
Le meas,
Lisa Nic Thiarnán
Runaí
Last modified: Wednesday, 24 November 2021 at 10:34pm