Six time All-Ireland Galway hurling manager Mattie Murphy has said that Croke Park must shoulder some of the blame for the recent scandals that have rocked Galway GAA.
Murphy said that the decision by Croke Park to force the hurling and football boards to merge in 2012 created a vacuum of leadership in Galway GAA.
Galway was ordered to restructure its administration after the Central Council took over the loan for the failed plan to build a centre of excellence outside Athenry.
The Irish Examiner reports that Murphy said that for many years the County Board were just figureheads while the hurling and football boards ran the show.
Each looked after their own gate fixtures, which were shockingly mismanaged in recent years according to the independent audit of Galway GAA conducted by Mazars.
But for all scandal that has erupted over the County Board’s handling of Galway GAA’s finances, Murphy doesn’t think it likely Galway will revert to anything like the old system.
Murphy added that he worries the €2.5 million loan for the aborted plans for Mountain South will become a “millstone” around the county’s neck.
Beyond that he expects the recent controversy will affect the county’s finances going into the future.
This year Galway GAA reported income of just under €5 million, but €860,000 of that was raised in America at events in Boston, New York, Chicago, and San Francisco.
Murphy said that in the future he can’t see that “many in America that will be rushing out to fund us now having seen recent developments.”
The former manager said that however painful it might have been to hear, Treasurer Mike Murphy did the right thing in bringing this to a head this year.
Now that this gross mismanagement has come to light, it’s time to put controls in place to make sure that it can’t happen again, he finished.
