John Kiely says that the ruling which prevents players from lining out at under-20 and senior level is “penalising our best players”.
The Limerick boss pitched Cathal O’Neill into their 11-point Munster semi-final win over Cork yesterday as a 57th minute sub, with the youngster advancing his claims for a starting spot in Saturday’s joust with Waterford by scoring two fine points.
However, as a result of featuring in the senior Championship, he is now ineligible to line out for the under-20 team in Wednesday night’s Munster Championship tie against Cork due to a GAA ruling that was introduced to protect young players from burnout.
O’Neill’s Limerick teammate Gearóid Hegarty last week described it as “the worst rule I have ever heard in my life”.
Limerick boss Kiely said: “It’s disappointing that we’re penalising our best players. We could make this work. Managements could make this work in the modern era. We monitor their loads for everything they do: if they go the gym or they’re with the 20s. We can make these things work.
“It’s a pity they’ve gone down this route because I don’t believe it’s the issue of burnout. These players, we look after.
“If Cathal was playing Wednesday night he wouldn’t be training with us on Tuesday night, clearly.
“He’d be rested until then and he came on [against Cork] and played 10, 15 minutes. There’s no reason he couldn’t play on Wednesday night and at the same time not be put in danger of further injury.”
In theory, O’Neill would become eligible for the under-20s later in the campaign if they are still involved and the senior team has been eliminated but this is most unlikely.
The All-Ireland under-20 final takes place on the weekend of May 21/22, a week after the Limerick seniors conclude their round robin phase in Munster, with Kiely’s side almost certain to be still in the hunt for major honours at that stage.
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