Kilcullen left in limbo after disappointing decision from Kildare LGFA

What should have been a week of great excitement for the town of Kilcullen has been plunged into turmoil following a contentious decision by Kildare LGFA that threatens to derail a highly anticipated county final.

“Our U16 girls, they beat Celbridge on Saturday to qualify for the ‘A’ Championship final,” Kilcullen LGFA Chairperson Martin Murphy explained to the Kildare Nationalist.

“The problem is, there's ten girls off that team that play with Kilcullen AFC and they’ve spent the last couple of months fundraising and organising a trip to Cambrils in Spain for this weekend.

“So, as you can imagine, parents and kids have been fundraising for the soccer weekend away; and that was in their calendar for months. But then the girls had a great win, qualified, and they're going to be playing Clane in the final. So straight away, the management knew this is not going to work. We're missing ten girls. We contacted Clane - Clane have been great – they said no problem, they understand, they’ve had similar problems in different grades and they're willing to play whenever suits.

“So, our club secretary went to the LGFA County Board straight away, and explained the situation, that we're missing ten players, nine of those ten played in the Celbridge match last weekend, and two of the ten are goalkeepers. So, we've no goalkeeper and we don’t have the players to fill the fixture because we don't have a second team. It's not as if we can call on another U16 group, we don't have them, so we’d have to resort to going U14s, who are too young to be playing two years up.

“We went back and forth (with Kildare LGFA), but eventually they sent us an email (Monday) to say they won't be moving the final. So, at this moment in time, we're going to have to forfeit the final, because we can't, obviously, field a team.” 

Kildare LGFA Juvenile Fixtures Secretary, Enda Walsh sent the following statement to Kilcullen:

“Congratulations on reaching the division 1 final. The fixture dates, including the finals and semi final dates. were ratified at the May county board meeting and have appeared in a number of fixtures reports since then. The finals date has always been the 17th of October.

“Unfortunately, we can't agree to a date after the ratified finals date. It's not allowed under the rules. We've received a number of requests to change dates for various reasons and have declined all requests. I appreciate that this is disappointing for your club.” 

An unimpressed Martin Murphy said of the statement: "Listen, it's grand saying that it's in the County Board meetings from last May, but these young girls, they're not thinking about County Board minutes back in May. And they're not thinking ahead to a County Final in October. They're thinking about going on this soccer trip, they’re thinking about fundraising for it.” 

Mr Murphy also raised another issue with the schedule, telling the Nationalist, “Our management had checked the dates in September when they became aware of the trip and it was posted on the website that the finals would be on the following weekend (Saturday, October 24th) so no issue. And to be fair, we were a long shot to make the final at that stage in any case.” 

Kilcullen have made huge strides over the last decade in growing ladies football in the club, earning a place in this year’s senior final for the first time ever, attracting a massive crowd of supporters to the game.

It would seem, to this reporter at least, firstly, the job of the LGFA is to help promote girls’ football in Kildare; yet their rigid stance on this decision is going to lead to a sham U16A Championship for 2026. And secondly, a club such as Kilcullen, who have done so much to develop ladies football within their club, deserve some leeway in this kind of scenario.

The Kildare Nationalist did reach out to Kildare LGFA for a response, but there has been no reply at time of publication.