Issue of capacity at Cedral St Conleths Park raised at County Board meeting

The thorny question of the true capacity of St Conleth’s Park had an airing right at the end of the Kildare County Board meeting on Tuesday night and it’s fair to say delegates were left scratching their heads as they disappeared into the Newbridge night air.

The issue was brought forward in the context of Club Kildare members being unable to obtain tickets for the Kerry championship game in June, a game that saw the ‘sold out’ signs go up but an official attendance of 9,957 returned despite the general understanding in the county that the newly developed ground would have a capacity of 15,000.

Chairman Mick Mullen was first to address the issue, pointing the finger fairly and squarely up the N7 to Croke Park.

“There’s two conflicting figures on it, from two different sources,” he told delegates. 

“We’re in the middle of trying to sort that out, and its under health and safety. Croke Park are saying one figure, and the design is saying another figure. Until we find out exactly what that is, we won’t be able to exactly tell you.

“We’re given a limit by Croke Park on any given day and it’s Croke Park that issue tickets, not Kildare GAA, for National League games and for Championship games. Croke Park put the limits on it. They open it up, they close it down, that’s nothing to do with Kildare GAA.” So, what is Croke Park’s limit, a delegate asked, not unreasonably.

“It depends on the group we have at a particular game,” they were told.

“The Kerry game was something like 10,000, just short of 10,000, that’s the capacity they will allow and they wouldn’t move beyond that.” 

It was put to the Chair that there was plenty of (additional) space in the ground that day.

Niall Sheridan, Facilities Officer, attempted to provide some further colour, but without really addresing the yawning gap between 10,000 and 15,000.

“As safety officer for the grounds themselves, there’s a difference between tickets sold and the capacity of the ground. Capacity in the ground will be in excess of 10,000 but the tickets sold might only be 9,500 because you have players’ tickets, VIP tickets, dignatory tickets, press tickets, family tickets. So, there is a disparity between what we can actually sell and the number of people that are actually here in the ground.” Then the finger was poked in the direction of Croke Park once more.

“Because we don’t sell stand tickets by seat number, Croke Park will automatically turn around and take 15% out of the capacity of the stand because they go ‘Johnny won’t move up and there’s a seat here and a seat there and people won’t move up.’ So, we are constrained in that way.” With the development having been designed and constructed prior to Mick Mullen’s ascension to the Chair, long-standing Treasurer Alan Dunney attempted to provide some historical colour.

“The design capacity is in excess of 13,000 with a guide path to 15,000. A lot of the problems in the old days were turnstile capacity, the access and egress, and that’s been addressed. The capacity of the stand I think is 3,000, give or take, and the balance is another 10,000 around the stadium, with potential to get (full capacity) to 15,000. That was always the intention. What Niall is saying is right. It happened us, you remember Newbridge or Nowhere, they took 15% of the tickets off us that night.” 

Not unreasonably, a delegate asked why they don’t sell stand tickets by seat numbers if that is causing a constraint on tickets (and presumably revenue). It was pointed out by another that earlier in the evening a call had come from the top table for clubs and members to support the county team, but the experience has been in 2026 that traveling away fans tend to arrive early at the ground and take up the bulk of the stand, with local Kildare supporters pushed to the margins or the terraces.

Sheridan took that one.

“It’s something we have looked at. But because we’re selling tickets through several different streams, be it in your local Centra or online, or Future Ticketing, it’s (a case of) marrying all those systems together, computer systems, to be able to sell ticket A1 so that the other system doesn’t also sell that ticket. So, for the time being the decision is taken it’s first come first served access to the grounds.” Could a section of the stand not be kept for Club Kildare supporters and why not, the Executive were asked.

The last word to Mick Mullen.

“It’s on a first come first served basis and that’s what it is. You can’t just lock it down for certain supporters. We have tried to manage the capacity coming in and we have tried to try and keep seats allocated for Club Kildare members. We have tried that and we’ve had some success with managing that, especially when there is stand tickets and terrace tickets because there’s a limit on both. When there’s an open ticket it becomes very difficult for us to manage that.” Perhaps time to try that again?

The only conclusion one could make, with around €18 million spent, it appears Kildare GAA is left with a stadium that Croke Park will only allow 10,000 to attend, a mere 2,000 more than attended the Newbridge or Nowhere game against Mayo eight years earlier. From a supporter, club or even taxpayer perspective, it surely leaves more questions than answers.