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  This weeks Club Notes

Morgan Bierne was named in this years Roscommon team of the year.

It has been a very successful year for Morgan who made his senior county debut in the national league and managed to hold his place over the entire season, a season which saw Roscommon getting to Croke Park for the first time since 1991.

Following last Sundays defeat to Castlerea in the Senior Club championship Strokestown Team Manager Pat Doorey and Club Chairman Sean Collins have Stepped-Down from their respective positions. Sean will continue on with the club until a new chairman is elected at the agm at the end of the year.

It is thus the end of Sean's three year term as Strokestown Chairman, surely one of the most successful Strokestown has ever had.

The cllub owes both Sean and Pat a huge Debt of gratitude 

With one of the worst performances by a referee that most of the crowd present at sundays championship second round have ever seen, four red cards were shown, two to players on each side. 

The catalyst for the indiscipline shown from both teams was the ref's failure to show Gregory McGrath a red card after he clearly elbowed Leo Shiel and then hit Morgan Bierne in the face. Kenny Bosquette, however, who got involved in the resulting brawl was sent off.

With both teams on edge for the rest of the match, several bust ups occured, resulting in the sending off of Damien Donlon for his reaction to Tom Ryans un-called for attack, as well as Ryan himself and St. Failtheachs David Leonard after recieving two yellow cards. Obviously the Ref had every right to issue these cards, the point is that he lost control of the match after failing to deal correctly with the initial situation. A series of terrible decisions, including playing nearly 10 minutes extra time, left the crowd feeling angry and made for a low-scoring, poor game of football.

Damien Donlon and Kenny Bosquette await their suspensions, but it is likely that Donlon will be out for a month, a huge and disappointing loss for the Town.

The First Round of the championship, where Strokestown will take on Michael Glavey's, will now take place even later in the year due to the great run by the county team.

Originally due to take place in mid-July, it is looking like the match might not go ahead until August. This would result in a general set-back of fixtures as seen last year when the league finals were played mid-way through this year.

The positive side of this is of course the county's fantastic run in this years championship. After recently overcoming Offaly in what was classed as one of the best matches this year so far, Roscommon take on Kildare on Saturday 26th of July, the winner going through to the Quarter Finals.

If Roscommon achieve this the long wait to see them play a senior match in Croke Parl would come to an end. it has been 13 years since the Ros last played in the GAA HQ, when they lost to Meath by 2 points in the Championship semi-final. 

Of course Strokestown legend Michael Donlon was a regular on the Roscommon Team of the early 90's. The Roscommon team of the early 'naughty's' failed to feature a first team player from Strokestown, and famously had none even on the panel last year when we won the county title. This year, however, a new hero has emerged from Strokestown to represent us at County level. Morgan Bierne has secured a half-back position and has been performing well. He has started in all championship matches to date, a fantastic feat for a player who just made his senior county debut this year, and was infamously left on the bench for our first round defeat against St. Aidans last year...

Well done to Morgan, he is a very fine representative of our club, my only wish is that he will progress to the center-half back position where he is undoubtedly at his best. Good luck in the rest of the Championship Morgan.

An other player to rise to county level after last years win is John Rogers, one of the towns finest youth players.

John has up until this year been concentrating on soccer, playing for Longford town and Sligo rovers.

However after the success the club enjoyed last year John has decided to dedicate his exceptional talents to GAA.

John was a late starter to gaelic football, when we were younger in the Boys school in Strokestown John was soccer and liverpool mad, and never seemed to pay any attention to gaelic. Obviously in a town like Strokestown this could never go on for to long, and John played his first gaelic football in the parish league in 1992(?), at the age of 11. He joined the under 12 team the same year, a team that was progressing well in the league and signs of the underage talent that was to emerge in the coming years was beginning to show.

With natural talent in abundance it didn't take John long to settle into Gaelic football and he soon found his position at half-back (in front of me!).

Since then John has been a corner-stone of our underage success, captaining the team many times, including for the Feile success when his speech was famously short but indicative of the character that is John.

He has proved his enormous worth time and time again in the black and amber, for underage teams, junior, intermediate and senior.

This year he made his first championship appearence for Roscommon against offaly when he came on as a substitute.

Now that he is concentrating on GAA, it will be exciting to watch his career progress, both for club and county.

The long awaited presentation of the above medals takes place on Sunday night next in FRANKS OF BALLYBEG (told ye no expense would be spared!!). The event will start somewhere between 6pm and 12 midnight, and will continue until Coman falls asleep (approx 12.30am). There will be fodder and liquid replenishment on the night and transport will be provided for anyone who wants to hit Rockfords later on (Davy and Rodg have new vans that will carry approx 17 players each).

As no team photograph was taken on the day of the County final it is hoped to have an official photograph taken at the weekend. It is pointless having a team photo taken unless every player from the Panel is available so we are asking you to make a special effort to be available for this. it will be taken at the football field on Sunday morning or Sunday evening, whichever is more convenient. Please bring your club gear including jackets and tops. Final details will be given at training Friday night.

As this was the first U21 championship to come into our club we hope to make it a memorable night and we hope that all U21 panel members will attend.

Sliggs is acting as master of ceremonies for the night and he has promised to learn at least one song. MC promises to do a striptease and reveal all the dirt on the boys, especially what Shaggy gets up to in Galway. Cian is making a guest appearence from Cardiff but fortunately hasn't picked up a ridiculous Welsh accent yet. Aido Cass is hoping to have all the exams finished and is anxious to get back into the swing of things, including training. The event is being broadcasted live on the Strokesotwn GAA website, Mickey Allen refuses to accept responsibility for any legal action taken against any player as a result of their actions.

Many thanks for all your hard work and commitment to the U21 team over the last few years. Congratulations to all players on your successes and we hope it will continue for many years in the BLACK AND AMBER.

See you all at the weekend,

Coman, Damo, Fozzie and Bob.

Sunday the 23rd of March saw Dublin play Roscommon in Dr. Hyde Park. With half the crowd watching with hands on their foreheads to block the sunshine the drenched the terraces, Roscommon were brought down to earth from their fantastic victory against Galway by a Dublin team looking to redeem thenselves and manager Tommy Lyons eager to prove his worth in front of ex-Dublin manager Tommy Carr, now in charge of the Ross. Interestingly enough the two opposite half backs for Ros and Dublin have a Strokestown connection, one more obvious than the other. The pride of Strokestown, Morgan Bierne lined out for his third successive start in this league campaign. Playing great stuff recently against the likes of Galway and Armagh, Morgan and the Roscommon Defense in general suffered from one of those inevitable off-days the football brings. However, like the roscommon defense, Morgan will bounce back I am sure of it. Also to be suubsituted during the Match was the Dublin captain, Half-Back Coman Goggins. Coman's father Brian is one of Strokestowns most fervent supporters, and is currently chairman of the Dublin Roscommon supporters club. Coman famously 'almost' played for Strokestown, and Roscommon, but it didn't work out. Now playing with the thriving young club Ballinteer St. John's, it could be said that Coman is in the right place, but what a boost it would have been for the town! (although we have no shortage of half Backs!!) Still, Hindsight is a great thing.......

The Annual Parish League started on March the 8th. The competition is for boys from 10 to 14 years old. The matches are 7-a-side and 15 minutes a half, the teams were decided by random selection.

See details of teams here

Latest Results Here

The Under 21's won strokestown's first under 21 title ever on Sunday.

Read about the match here

Read about the history of this team here

Morgan Beirne, the Town's center half back, is currently on the Senior County Development Panel. He started for the county at center half back recently against Offaly.

We wish Morgan the very best of luck over the coming year with the County team.

Also involved with the county is Rory Farrell and Dermot Lohan who are currently on the minor panel.

Well done lads and the best of luck.

The dinner dance that was to celebrate surely the most successful year in Strokestown GAA History took place on the 24th of january in the Percy French Hotel. Guest Stars included Kieran McGeeney of Armagh and Brian Carty, a native of Strokestown

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Website reviews and well wishers...                                        26/01/03

The Strokestown GAA website was recently added to the links section of a popular Roscommon Supporters website, sheepstealers.com, with the following link description:

'Strokestown -without question, an excellent website- everything a great GAA site should aspire to be. These boys are county champions too..'

Ciaran P. Roche, professional webmaster and developer of the Ballymun Kickhams website, winner of several website awards, left me this message:

Excellent website!! It is , without question, one of the best club GAA sites I've seen. it's clean, professional, fast loading, easily navigated... great job!!!

I developed the Ballymun Kickhams website, so I know how many hours you put into the site.

Ciaran P. Roche