Hanley claims hurling clubs not supporting their own

Roscommon senior hurling manager, Brian Hanley, has appealed to Roscommon hurling clubs to offer more support to their own players in the aftermath of his side’s ten-point defeat against Donegal at King and Moffatt Dr. Hyde Park.

The former All-Ireland winning club player with Athenry has brought plenty of enthusiasm to the role since his appointment at the start of the season, but he described Saturday’s performance as “terrible”, adding that hurling clubs haven’t been supportive enough of the team.

“I did a Coaching and Games Workshop earlier this month entitled ‘Raising Standards and Improving Culture’, and there were 30 people in the room. None of the club people came in. 

"I went around to every club, they didn’t get on board, they didn’t come in, and they didn’t support that. They didn’t back their own players.

“I hope they take on board after today that they need to take a look at themselves and say, ‘how can we promote Roscommon hurling more’ because there won’t be outsiders always coming in here.

“We have won league games with full Roscommon players on the team. They need to look at that and drive that on, or otherwise they are going to stay in the division they are in,” he exclaimed.

The manager also claimed that, like his predecessors, it was proving extremely difficult to get the county’s best hurling players to commit to the cause.

“That team wasn’t the Nickey Rackard team. There were only a few of them on that team last year. We built a new team from scratch. 

"The most disappointing thing is the amount of people you contact that are supposed to be good players that won’t come in and play for Roscommon. I think that is the bigger issue,” he said.