Moving my kids to another GAA club

Why on earth should a parent have to explain why they want to move their kids to another club?

This is the sickening part of the GAA. It happened to me and I stopped playing it .

was playing with one club but went to school on another . Transferred to the other club as it was closer and I had a better connection . I was in a neutral parish so I had no affiliation to either back in the day.

the old club objected to 2 titles I won with the new club and their so called representatives turned up a soccer matches to abuse me verbally . “ your no f€€€king good “ etc “ your only out of bed “whilst his own son was playing on the same team as me .

That individual played “briefly” for the county back in the 70s and what a little man he turned out to be . I watch him now stand by his grandchildren as they line out for the county and wonder would have have said that to them what he said to me .

By the way I’m a soccer coach .

You mention that "they won't release the players" and "we were not allowed to move to the new club". You also say, that you have not been in touch with the county board so I presume that it is the current club that is standing in your way.

It is not the current club who gets to decide where your kids can and can't go. It is 100% the County Board that decides. Your current club can object to the transfer based on whatever grounds they want, but ultimately it is the county board that decide.

So, you need to get onto the County Board and look for a transfer request form. In the form, I would keep in simple and just say they are transferring to the club where they go to school. Then your current club will have a chance to object if they wish and the county board will make a call on it..... From there, if you are not happy with the decision, you can appeal etc

But, nothing is going to happen until you formally apply.

Also, I don't know if you have done it already, but it would also be worthwhile talking to someone in the club you wish to move to as they may be able to give you a hand with the paperwork/process etc

OP - it would be helpful to know at least which county you're based in, even if you don't want to give away too many details. Transfer bye-laws vary from one county to the next.

However, all have to comply with the general rules of the Association, with the main one still being the First Club rule (colloquially known as "the parish rule"). People can't just up sticks and move from any one club to any other at any given time, whenever they feel like it.

I'm involved in GAA admin at a fairly high level myself and would like to give you the most accurate advice possible, but in order to do so, I'd need the sort of details that I'm guessing you're reluctant to share publicly. PM me if you like.

That's mad - these are not inter county 'stars' - they're just kids 12-15 yr olds. You wouldn't like to see them lose out, but if I was the parent involved, I wouldn't go along with this bullying. Lots of other sports that can be pursued that don't have this nonsense. Saw a bit of this carry on with the Community Games of all things, neighbouring areas bitching about children and I mean children who wanted to go along with their friends. Shameful stuff.

Munsterfan is basically saying what I think. My children are younger 9-11 but my ex wife took them to the club her football mad father was involved with, and away from the club ( but for the pandemic) i wanted to bring them where their school friends played at and they knew no-one and promptly quit. Underage sport is playtime, exercise

God, absolute state of the club and GAA here. You'd swear it was the premier league. They're kids ffs you think they'd let them move

They wouldn't be insured unless they are registered with the club so not allowed play or train with another club.

It's a very parochial structure - for a country that's not so fond of some borders, we've far too many borders at local level. Might have suited a carless rurally based agricultural society in the early 20th century where people grew up, married locally and lived/ worked locally. Not so much in the current modern Ireland.

Live near parish & county borders ourselves and it's striking how many facets of society from community games to GAA to bin collections to health services and school transport etc it impacts on.

Have a word with someone in the club outside the county and explain the situation. Transfer in to them and immediately transfer out to the club you want the kids to play for. If the new club don't object there should be no issues.

As @celt262 says in the very next post, absolutely do NOT do this. I know the suggestion was made with the best of intentions, but there's no getting away from the fact that it's not a good suggestion. If your children are not properly registered with that other club, they are absolutely not covered if they suffer any injury or other mishap even in training or practice matches. It would be wholly irresponsible of the other club to allow this, and they'd be badly exposed if anything did happen to any of your children.

You could even sue that club for recovery of medical expenses or other damages, on the grounds that they shouldn't have let your children play, even though they'd ostensibly have been doing you a favour in the first place. Might sound far-fetched, but similar things have happened in clubs in the past.

OP seems to have gone from this thread at this stage anyway, so unlikely to be back myself either. Offer to PM me still stands.

And just before I go - this is absolutely spot on, as regards the very ethos of the Association. From the Official Guide:

the Gaelic Athletic Association is community centred, based on the allegiance of its members to their local Clubs and Counties

Other sporting organisations are purely club-based. The GAA is community-based. Those of us immersed in the GAA consider it one of its greatest strengths. Others consider it a major fault. There are people here on both sides of that divide!

From your first post:

"they won't be able to be county board games but they'll be able to train or blitzes" (I presume you meant to say "play in blitzes")

This is where it's not a good suggestion. They won't be covered for training, blitzes, or any other activity with that club if they are not properly registered members of that club. Club and parents alike would be irresponsible to allow children take part in such activity without being registered and therefore properly covered.

Not a bad suggestion to at least talk to the other club, but definitely not a good suggesion to say they could take part in training/blitzes with that other club in the meantime.

In my County underage players can transfer at any time provided they have not played championship for their current team in the current year. e.g. they cannot play in a championship with two different clubs in one year.

Here in a dual county hurling and football are separated in the Calender and not all clubs have teams in both at all ages, so transfers are regular enough, e.g. a player that prefers hurling might be in a club that doesn't have a hurling team in their age bracket might transfer to a club that does.

The standard procedure is the club you wish to join sends the form to the County Board who contact the club you were with, and if they sign off all is well and done.

Ultimately, you as the parent of the kids will decide who the kids play with, not the club who they have played with or anyone else. It just depends how much hassle you are prepared to cause to get your way.

There are rules and County bye laws, but ultimately the law of the land is what takes precedent. My own club has rightly and wrongly been involved in a few of these cases, and once parents dig the rules are meaningless.... Threaten to get the lads with the wigs involved and you'll see.

I'd normally be against getting legal eagles involved, but this rule is a very blunt instrument for today's society, with mobile families and different societal changes. Most officials know this and are very fair-minded, but all it takes is one asshole with a bit between his teeth to cause a lot of hassle.

The law courts on both sides of the border generally don't get involved in such cases that you mention above as they (quite rightly) don't get involved in the rules of private groups and associations with the exception of demonstrating visible harm or discrimination because of the rules they set i.e. they don't determine what group of membership can is provided. Some arsehole may try and threaten the legal route and while some might fold in the face of this others will simply tell them "Go ahead!" knowing that they'll likely win and get their costs covered. In any case, a failure to constructively go through the rule book regarding membership & transfers in the GAA both through the Official Guide & local bye-laws up to & including the DRA will highly unlikely impress a court of law. As it is, the DRA has in the past passed at least one verdict on a matter such as this and IIRC they determined that the players in question would have to formally nullify their GAA membership first, nothing that simply not paying annual membership dues with the last club you paid them to doesn't cease your membership of the GAA.

As it is, in most Ulster counties at least transfers of youth players away from their first clubs tends to attract very heavy scrutinty even when the club being left by the player has no objection to the transfer. Quite often a youth transfer will only be sanctioned by the county if it can be unambiguously shown that the player looking to transfer to a new club is now permanently living in the catchment area of the new club and has done so for a minimum time period e.g. three months. If even a sniff of cute hoorism is suspected in trying to get the transfer approved, it'll be immediately rejected.

Personally, all parents/guardians wishing for their child to get involved in GAA sports should be aware of the rules regarding youth transfers at both central and local levels if they have any idea that they might want to move them to a different club in the future. If you don't like the current rules, then either don't have your children get involved in elements of the association that you'd rather not wish to be associated with, or get a club in question to propose an amendment to either their county for local bye-laws or for the GAAs annual congress to change the Offical Guide on how such transfers are handled. Contrary to what many parents in such scenarios think, your child in over 99% of cases isn't deserving of special treatment when looking a transfer.

Surely in this day and age, it should be soley up to the parents of a child where that child should play? Child welfare/safety should be the priority.

I presume your tongue is firmly in your cheek.

My nephew was on a very successful underage team in rugby up until he was around 15, then they lost 5 or 6 core players who went off to play for better clubs or schools teams and the club had to start from scratch. The same happened to the local soccer team when I was in secondary, they had a great team until few were picked up by academies in home farm, St pats etc and the local team fell apart.

I know its unlikely to be much comfort to the op but this is exactly what the gaa is trying to avoid, and they are pretty good at it

A typo, of course, no intention to beamirch the Killererin Chairperson in any way, assuming they are not involved in this saga 😂

By and large, protections against needless transfers, especially from smaller clubs to bigger ones, where players will fall out of the system somewhere along the line inevitably.

My point is that the parish rule is a poor mechanism nowadays. There are always ways around it, I've seen a So called bigger club poach 14 year old from us for instance, where the lads head was turned by a family member, and because his mother was born in that parish he got his transfer eventually (following a pretty overt threat of legal action.). As usual, the rulebook can always be beaten if there is enough pressure out on, and the threat of a long public battle (eg if poor Johnny has his picture in the paper saying the big bad GAA man won't let me play football with my friends).

That'll be football (soccer) & rugby (union, I presume) that limit what countries you can represent at international level?

What does the club Child Welfare Officer have to say on the issue?

Its hard to fathom the politics of the GAA sometimes - even at underage levels......