New Divisional Board

West Cork Committee

Between 1887, when Gaelic games under the umbrella of the GAA were first played in West Cork,  and 1899, the whole county was under the complete control of the Cork County Board, based in Cork City. This led to many difficulties for West Cork clubs, especially having to travel to the city frequently to play championship games. By 1900 the GAA was struggling badly in the west, with less than a handful of clubs from the whole area playing in the county championship. The idea began to grow that Gaelic games would never thrive in West Cork if the area didn’t have a board of its own to run its own affairs.

      While the West Cork GAA people were looking for a separate County Board, completely independent of the Cork County Board, this was never going to be entertained by the GAA hierarchy but in 1900 the Cork County Board did agree that West Cork could have a committee to run the games in the area. This new committee had very limited powers, although it did run a new West Cork football championship. No hurling was played in West Cork in those years. West Cork was the first area in the county to be granted its own committee.

     Unfortunately, this new committee soon found itself at loggerheads with the existing County Board and over the next 25 years it was disbanded and reformed a number of times. While some of the fault for the committee’s lapses could be traced to the social, economic and political difficulties of those years, and to differences with the County Board, many of the problems came from within the area itself.

      A sense of apathy swept West Cork at times as regards GAA activity and this led to some clubs in the eastern side of the area actually playing in south Cork leagues, instead of forming their own West Cork competitions. This came to a head in the early part of the 1920s, after Ireland had won its independence. In those few years, 1922 to 1925, the County Board finally set up the Divisional Boards we still have in the county today but as there was a committee already in existence in West Cork, that committee was given the title of West Cork Divisional Board.

      However, the new title failed to rouse interest in activity and, following the devastation of the Civil War 1922/23, GAA activity still hadn’t recovered by 1925.  

South Cork Board set up

 Although the convention of the West Cork Board took place early in 1925 there was no further meeting or action on the playing fields until July. Because of this inactivity, five clubs in the eastern part of the area decided to look for permission to set up a separate Board of their own. The five clubs who had participated in the South Cork hurling league, i.e. Bandon, Kilbrittain, Innishannon, Kinsale and Knockavilla, received permission from the County Board to set up a new division to be known as the “South Cork Board.” Unfortunately, no records are available of the meeting to set up the new Board, which was to become the “South-West Cork Board” the following year, 1926,  when Clonakilty joined.

     The officers of the South Cork Board for 1925 were  – Chairman, Seán Forde, Knockavilla; vice-chairman, Dan O’Hea, Kilbrittain; secretary, Seán Murphy, Innishannon; treasurer, J.J. Phelan, Bandon.