Galway FA Chairman resigns
Ger Gibbons, the Chairman of the Galway Football Association (GFA), resigned last night and he sent out a mind boggling resignation e-mail to secretaries of every club in Galway. To give context in his e-mail, the Galway FA have just created a new academy with 18 coaches and they didn't include one Galway United representative on it, despite the club having under 15, 17 and 19 teams and expressing their interest in joining it. Also the reference to renting out upstairs is an area Galway United paid to refurbish above the bar at Eamonn Deacy Park. The Galway FA sold it to an uhlsport representative (who coincidentally is also a coach on the new academy...), meaning we couldn't use it on match nights and the Galway FA representative who sold it... his son subsequently also got a job with that uhlsport branch. You literally couldn't make it up.
Hi all
It is with regret that I have to announce that I am standing down as Chairman of the Galway FA with immediate effect. The main reason that I am doing this is the constant negative attitude towards Galway United I would nearly go as far as saying that some people on the Galway FA hope that Galway United as a football club would collapse.
When the catering contract came up for renewal Galway United offered more money then the other bidder but the lower bid got the contract.
When Galway United enquired last year about putting in a bar in the old dressing rooms in EDP there was serious opposition to it but practically no opposition to renting out upstairs for 3 years which I agree with as you have to get a reasonable length of time to recover your outlay on renovations.
The contract I signed with Galway United for the bar on behalf of the committee was for one year at a reduced fee so that Galway United could recoup some of the 10000 euro they spent renovating the old dressing rooms. The fee for the next season was up for discussion at around the end of this year but an email was sent to Galway United telling them to remove all their stuff from the bar area and to restore it to its original condition this in my opinion was not what was agreed earlier this year.
The decision to restore the dressing rooms was seemingly taken by some members of the football committee and other people who are not on the Galway FA and without consultation with the full committee of the Galway FA so that this new academy could use them. Why would we need this when we have the finest dressing rooms in the League of Ireland.
The academy which I agree is the right think to do but it should be in conjunction with Galway United who despite comments on social media did make contact with a member of the Galway FA about running this jointly but was told that he would discuss with the committee and get back to him. When he did get back to Galway United he said the committee were not interested, I am not sure what committee did discuss this but it was not the full committee. Also the academy was seemingly launched last weekend and the first I knew of it was when I saw the picture on Facebook of all the coaches in EDP not sure who knew about the launch but I as chairman definitely didn't
Finally work started this week on the removal of the bar and I do not know who gave that instruction to remove it.
So after 10 years on the GFA and 2 years as chairman that's it folks all I ever wanted from my involvement with the GFA was to improve things in Galway football we succeeded for a while but things seem to going back to the old ways fighting and bickering and the only ones that suffer are the people that are the most important which is the PLAYERS
Yours in sport
Ger Gibbons
