Brennan: Bradley comments were ill-advised
13/07/2012 - 14:54:25
Derry football manager John Brennan has blasted his captain Paddy Bradley over his recent criticism of the County Board and their support of the county team.
Bradley described it as 'the lowest ebb' of his 13-year senior inter-county career as Derry crashed out to Longford in the All-Ireland SFC qualifiers a fortnight ago.
He appeared on BBC Radio Ulster afterwards and was quoted in various newspapers, hitting out at the County Board over financial issues and an alleged "apathy" towards playing for Derry.
The poor scheduling of club Championship matches and a lack of 15-a-side challenge/training games hindered Derry's chances of making progress in the 2012 Championship, according to Bradley.
An untimely run of club fixtures allied to the unwillingness of some clubs to release their players to train with the Derry panel led to 9-a-side training games being held before the Longford clash.
Former All-Star Bradley argued: "Everything is a penny-pinching operation. The physios were called into a meeting recently. They were pulled about players strapping up their wrists because of the cost of the tape.
"Don't get me wrong, we get our expenses, our mileage and our gear. We get what is required. But you get the bare minimum. You don't get anything over and beyond.
"I think that is part of the reason why there is such apathy towards playing for the county. The players know that they're not going to be looked after like the Dublins and the Corks of this world.
"Let's be honest, some of the best players aren't turning out. They aren't making themselves available and we can't afford to have our best players not playing for us."
"Before we played Donegal (in the Ulster Championship), the clubs played six matches in three weeks. For the County Board to set six matches in that space of time is madness.
"We lost key men to injury. Gerard O'Kane is the stand-out. It's madness. No other county is doing it. I know I will be criticised. I know I will get abuse for it. But the bottom line is I am telling the truth."
However, Derry boss Brennan says Bradley should have kept his comments to himself and discussed the issues privately with the management and County Board.
"There's an in-house rule in sport that you don’t talk outside the four walls of the dressing room, but Paddy Bradley didn’t observe that," Brennan told the Irish News.
"Paddy committed the cardinal sin of going to the media and spouting out on whatever grievances he felt he had.
"There’s a time and place for speaking your mind, and if Paddy was dissatisfied with some elements of the set-up in the county he should have made his feelings known to the team management, to the officers of the County Board or to the other players."
Regarding financial support, Brennan, who has finished his second season at the helm, reckons that the County Board provide an adequate amount of funding to the Derry panel.
"As far as I’m concerned there was no lack of funding by the County Board and certainly a lot of things that Paddy said were not true.
"I can’t read into Paddy’s brain and I haven’t been talking to him since the Longford game, but it certainly was a huge shock that he made his comments within 12 hours of the final whistle at Pearse Park."
Bradley was unsure of his own future in the Derry jersey when speaking after the qualifier defeat, and also hinted at a lack of communication between manager and captain.
"I don't know what John is going to do next year, I don't know what the senior players - myself included - are going to do next year," said the Glenullin forward.
"I honestly don't know if I'll be playing (for Derry next year). I know that there needs to be huge changes made - from the County Board to the management to the players. We all need to take a serious look at it."
Speaking about his managerial future with the Oak Leafers, Brennan said it is 'too early' to make a decision in that regard.
"There are a lot of issues which will have to be considered, and the rest of the management team, myself and the officers of the County Board will get down to discussing them in due course," he said.
"Since we came in, we’ve been working on a 12-month basis so officially our time is up. But we don’t know yet whether we want to continue, or whether the County Board want us to continue for another year."
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