THE LAST POINT: Build it because they're already here!

Regular readers of this column - and even the irregular ones! - know all too well that  I'm fond of a good movie analogy and Field of Dreams with its memorable tagline “Build it and they will come” has featured quite a bit in my pleadings for the improvement of sporting facilities in this part of our fair isle.

“Build it and they will come” evokes an image so simple that not even the clumsy words of this writer can spoil it's impact but what happens if they've already come and the facilities just aren't there? It is a question the good folk of Abbey Rovers AFC and Ballinamore Sean O'Heslins GAA club are asking right now as they launch an impassioned plea for vital funding to develop astro-turf facilities in the area.

It is not that long ago that Ballinamore Sean O'Heslins found themselves in an unthinkable position of having to join forces with Kiltubrid so that their Juvenile footballers could continue to play the game they love, the dearth of young people in the area threatening the long term viability of the club. And it is not just the GAA club that suffers because everybody pulls from the same pool and if the numbers aren't there, well then the clubs won't be and it will be the social fabric of life in Leitrim that will ultimately suffer as a result.

That's why, as urgent as their appeal for funding to develop an astro-turf facility is, it is truly heartening to hear of Abbey Rovers talk of their growing numbers and the challenges they face in trying to cater for their growing numbers, a challenge that some of you will scoff at but one that will resonate somewhat differently depending on where you live in the county.

Carrick-on-Shannon and the greater area around know full well what Abbey Rovers are talking about -  the plans to develop the long awaited and desperately needed Shannonside Recreational Campus are  anxiously waiting to see if their applications under the Large Scale Sport Infrastructure Fund will be successful, even as they plough on, figuratively and literally, with fundraising and ground works at the site on the Castlecarra Road.

THE LAST POINT: CHANGE GAME FOR GAELIC FOOTBALL NEEDS A LOT OF GOODWILL

I'm sure the same challenges are being felt in Manorhamilton, Dromahair, Kinlough and even Dromod where there has been a population explosion over the last 20 to 30 years - an explosion that is only beginning to be felt on the playing field of Leitrim, whatever the sport because it takes time for demographics to take effect.

What makes the situation on the ground so perplexing is the undeniable fact that our urban centres are bursting at the seams while a lot of our rural areas are struggling for numbers - they'd love to have too many youngsters coming through the ranks with more than a few organisations and even primary schools starting to worry where their next generations are coming from.

One of the peculiar features is that over the past 3o plus  years, our county's population has rocketed by almost 40%. Back in 1991, 25,301 souls called Leitrim home, it may actually have been much smaller than that with quite a few people living in the big smoke - the last census told us that 35,199 are now living within our borders, a total last achieved back in the 1950s.

Most of that population boom has gone into the urban centres - Kinlough has gone from 305 in 1991 to 1,196; Ballinamore from 743 to 1,112. Manorhamilton has almost doubled - 995 to 1,667 while Drumshanbo has more than doubled from 588 to 1,240! Dromod has gone from 210 in 2006 to 753 in the last census just two short years ago.

All of them lag behind Carrick-on-Shannon which has almost tripled in size from 1,858 in 1991 to a staggering 4,743 some 31 years later. So while the county has gained almost 10,000 new residents over 30 years, more than half of that is concentrated in a few areas who are now struggling with facilities to cater for their incredible growth - the population is here  right now, even if the facilities aren't, and that is the challenge facing Abbey Rovers and Ballinamore Sean O'Heslins. 

In other areas, they have the opposite problem - clubs with facilities but they don't have then players, a problem referenced in Dermot Crowe's superb piece “Death of a GAA Club” in the most recent edition of The Sunday Independent, detailing the challenges facing a number of GAA clubs in Longford with Leitrim getting a notable mention towards the end of the piece.

Shroid Slashers and Frogney, historic clubs with good club grounds, no longer field while Moydow Harpers, who first took to the field in 1897, amalgamated with fellow parishioners St Patrick's Ardagh and now take to the field as Ardagh Moydow - the sort of compromise that would have some in Leitrim turning in their graves were it to happen in this county.

But maybe that is exactly where we are heading - Leitrim's own GAA County Board Secretary Declan Bohan is quoted towards the end of Crowe's missive with an ominous warning of what might be coming down the tracks: “We have been doing an analysis on the primary school numbers in those areas and they're raising red flags for a lot of rural clubs. The demographics are going significantly towards the towns in the county.”

It is not the first time Bohan has issued this stark warning - some, wrongly, took it is a shot across the bow of the town clubs but the reality is that demographics, population shifts and difficulties in obtaining planning permission in rural areas means that the built up areas in this county have become bigger and maybe at the expense of their struggling rural neighbours.

To quote Bohan again, consider the startling facts: “The trend is that 70 per cent of the young people, which are ultimately the future of any club, are living in the areas of about seven of our clubs. And we have 23, so there's 14 clubs facing challenges. They're not in any serious difficulty but at the bottom end of that, there's a number of clubs that are in trouble. They probably will survive but they are going to be challenged.”

Ironically, without knowing that he had chatted with Crowe, I was making the same point to Declan last Saturday as we watched an incredibly young St Mary's Kiltoghert second string team do battle with Drumkeerin, a team that still has stalwarts who played in an Intermediate Final all the way back in 2008!  

THE LAST POINT: THE RIGHT PATH IS NOT AN EASY PATH

It doesn't take a crystal ball to see clubs already in difficulty - look at the team sheets of various club teams over the past two or three weeks in the pages of the Observer and you see teams in all grades of adult football, including senior, populated by at least a third of their team in the late 30s and even early to mid 40s. That's not sustainable long term, even if by the very act of togging out, those players are ensuring the survival of their clubs.

What that means for the GAA clubs of the county is uncertain but the chances are, that in the future, some will be forced to amalgamate or share facilities and that is why an astro-turf facility in Ballinamore is a sign of things to come. Abbey Rovers serves not just the town of Ballinamore but the parishes all around it and further a-field, from Mohill to Aughawillan, maybe Carrigallen to Kiltubrid. 

Look at what the Dromahair Arts & Recreation Centre has achieved where their astro-turf  facility caters for soccer and GAA teams from all over Leitrim and Sligo - an example of what shared sporting facilities can achieve for a community. The numbers may be small compared to the big cities but the absolute necessity for developing these facilities is as plain as the nose on your face and if we are to develop these facilities, the partnership between Abbey Rovers and Ballinamore Sean O'Heslins and between all the sporting bodies around the greater Carrick on Shannon area is the way of the future.