The GAA’s new centre of excellence at the National Sports Campus (NSC) in Blanchardstown will not be Dublin’s alone. GAA director general Paraic Duffy yesterday insisted the All-Ireland champions will not get preference on the use of the €8m facility and it will be available to all counties once completed.
The Dublin County Board will be contributing the €2m of funding originally earmarked for their own centre in Rathcoole and will now work with the GAA to improve the NSC plans.
The centre will contain five floodlit pitches and, while the Dubs will effectively make it their new home, the size of the facility will ensure that this will not come at the expense of other counties.
“The GAA will have first call on it nationally,” Duffy said.
“Dublin won’t have the first call but I wouldn’t really see that ever being a problem because you have five pitches here.
“First call is national, but realistically Dublin will be here any time they want to because the facilities are there. Dublin won’t have first call but they’ll have use of it. That won’t cause any grief, everybody can be facilitated.”
One of the pitches will replicate the exact dimensions of Croke Park so as to provide for teams playing at GAA HQ. The building, which will accompany the pitches, is set to be completed in 2016.
“We want this to be used to the maximum,” explained Duffy. “We would see Dublin using it extensively, but it’s not only for Dublin. Dundalk is an hour from here and Gorey is from the south.
“Most of the population of the country is within an hour from here. We would envisage counties using it for blitzes, festivals, Fitzgibbons, Sigersons and for international teams too.”
At yesterday’s sod-turning ceremony in Dublin 15, GAA president Liam O’Neill said the likes of Kildare, Meath and Wicklow could easily utilise the pitches.
However, Dublin chairman Andy Kettle told The Irish Examiner the facility will satisfy a need for Dublin GAA to have a centre of excellence, and the fact that many surrounding counties have their own facilities already could mean the Dubs will have little competition for space at the new venue.
“Our interest is huge because we don’t have a centre of excellence,” Kettle said. “Our county teams are training all over the place. This gives us an opportunity to centralise it. Obviously, geographically it suits us.
“If you look at the surrounding counties, Meath have theirs; Louth have Darver; Wicklow are in the process of finishing theirs; Kildare have Hawkfield.
“The requested usage from those counties may not be terribly high. I would certainly see requested usage from counties coming up to play matches in Croke Park at weekends.”
Kettle went on to speak of the major benefits of a centralised training area, with personnel and teams from both codes and of various ages able to work in close proximity: “There is, to my mind, a huge benefit of teams in both codes, hurling and football, training in the same location, whereby the minor manager, the U21 manager, the senior manager, start singing off the same hymn sheet and a style of play develops as guys come into minor level.”
