Ladies Gaelic Football

ladiesgaelic.ie // 41 LYN SAVAGE LOOKS TO THE FUTURE Volume 14 | Issue No 1 | PEIL Spring ecently appointed National Development Manager Lyn Savage shares some throughts on where she sees greatest potential in the LGFA and also some of her team's priorities for the coming years. It has been a busy 10 years with the LGFA in my role as National Development Oºcer. The LGFA has changed so much since I started and the key for me in my new role as National Development Manager will be to ensure that the growth and progression continues. It will not be easy to follow in Paula Prunty's footsteps as she ensured that LGFA were ahead of the game but the fact that she is still in the oºce next door willl be of huge advantage to me. When examining LGFA games development it would be easy to get lost in all the potential and possibilities but over the next few years there will be a number of key priority areas. Firstly there is a very strong development team in place. I am delighted to say that the structures of national and provincial sta" are now more aligned which will make our planning and delivery of support to Counties more e"ective and eºcient. In our national oºce our sta" has grown. William Harmon, Aisling Doonan, Niall Mulrine, and Clare Dowdall now make up our national development oºcers with Shauna McNutt employed as the development support administrator. During my time as a development oºcer the key to most of our success was the volunteers that we work with on a daily basis. We have a key strand in our upcoming strategic plan on volunteer development. It is essential that we support our volunteers in their role and have key resources in place for recruitment, retention and recognition of personnel at all levels. The role of the volunteer is becoming ever increasingly diºcult, we are making it a priority to create environments that are safe, nurturing and welcoming for all volunteers. The growth rates in ladies gaelic football have been rapidly increasing and with that comes the need for solid structures. All units of the LGFA, from club to International level Potential and Priorities need to be engaged to ensure we have strong foundations, that can continue to grow without any unnecessary restraints. Gaelic4Girls, Gaelic4Teens and Gaelic4Mothers&Others have been major success stories and have aided our swift expansion over the past few years and the pivotal success factor of these initiatives is that they were derived from consultation with clubs. We will continue this open communication to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our members. Players, coaches and referees will also feature heavily on our development plans, each one being a very important entity on their own. Coach education is essential. We need to safeguard our players by making sure they are receiving high level coaching regardless of their playing level. Our current playing structures will be examined to ensure they are meeting the needs of our playing population. Too many players have ended their career too early. We need to look at the reasons why this is happening and question if we have the appropriate county and club player pathways in place and the coaching framework to match. Increasing our support for referees is a must. Currently there are a number of counties that have not engaged in referee education for over 3 years and this is not good enough. Better quality referee education will improve engagement which will also improve consistency on the field of play. When discussing knowledge of the rules it will also be a priority to ensure coaches have a clear understanding of the rules of the game. Often lack of knowledge of the rules on the sideline results in a referee's job being harder than it needs to be. Another important area that we will assist our members with is funding submissions. There are frequent opportunities for clubs, counties and provinces to apply for funding from various grant schemes, both local and national through government, local sports partnerships and other avenues but there are very few applications received from ladies gaelic football. It is imperative that we gain more knowledge about these when they become available but also they we can o"er guidance and advice on submissions to increase the chance of being successful. Above is just a flavour of some the areas that we as a development team will focus on over the coming years but it is an ever changing environment and we need to be willing to adapt and be dynamic when required. I urge all units to work with our development team, both national and provincial oºcers together, and make us aware of your constraints so that we may be in a position to assist you and provide support. To me, I am currently working with one of the leading female sports organisations in the world. There is an intriguing future ahead for the game and I look forward to being part of the development of the LGFA. R

• Cover