Exodus of hurling talent a major problem for Meath

Meath u-21 hurling manager Mike Cole has claimed that talented dual players in Meath are being "encouraged" to concentrate on football rather than the small ball game. Cole presided over his first competitive match in charge of the u-21s when his team defeated Louth in the opening round of the Leinster A HC at Darver last week. It turned out to be an easy victory for the Royal County yet Cole knows there are much stiffer tests ahead if a provincial crown is to be retained. Beyond that there is the even bigger challenge of trying to halt Meath's steady slide down the hurling ranks. The tendency for the majority of clubs in Meath to focus on football is one of the reasons, he feels, the Royal County has fallen behind counties such as Westmeath and Carlow while Dublin have moved into a new stratosphere altogether. He points out how the current Dublin team and NHL champions started off playing together at around 11 or 12 years old and stayed together through the ranks, helping to forge a strong bond along the way. "They (Dublin) have even got a few lads back from football. That rarely happens in Meath, we rarely get lads back from football. If they get half an idea that they'll make the football panel then they're gone. "The problem is they're encouraged not to play hurling, absolutely. Everybody knows that, but nobody will say it. That's the way it is. "We're trying our best to keep those lads, the dual players, to try and keep them happy so that we can get the best out of them so that they might play hurling with us," he said. "The carrot is there. Meath football is what it is and they see the carrot to get in there and if they get half a chance they will take the opportunity and they'll stay there until the bitter end until they do or don't make it and by that stage our hurling championships are over." Cole can recall the time from his own playing days with Meath in the early and mid-1990s when the hurlers in the green and gold could defeat the likes of Wexford and Offaly. They regularly got the better of Westmeath and Carlow. Meath would have been even considered superior to Dublin at the time yet while these counties have moved up to another level the Royal County slipped back into the relative obscurity of the Nicky Rackard Cup before resurfacing to just about retain their status in the Christy Ring this year. "We'll have to call a spade a spade, we have come down a long way from where we were in the early to mid-1990s. "This is a whole new generation, we have to build again, it's as simple as that, we have been struggling in the Christy Ring for a few years now. "We went down to the Nicky Rackard and won it, fair enough, but now we are stuck somewhere in the middle," he said after the game at Darver. As well as trying to win a trophy or two Cole sees his role as coaching the young players, helping to bring them up to a level whereby, the best of them, will be able to graduate onto the senior panel next year. A healthy competition for places is needed at senior level he believes, if performances are to impove on a consistent basis. Cole insists there is a lot of good work being carried out in the county when it comes to coaching youngsters. "The problem is we're losing an awful lot of young players, good players who are going to football and that's going to happen in a football-dominated county. "Unfortunately some of the lads we're losing are among the cream of the crop, we're only keeping a few of those lads, we're not filtering enough from u-21 to senior and it's showing. "The average age of our team has come up and I probably wouldn't be helping in that way," he added with a laugh. "We say we're going to work together, but at the end of the day you have football people saying why should we let those lads go play hurling, we want them for football because that's going to be their preference."