Boys upset after tournament ban

May 21 2009 by Peter McCluskey, Hamilton Advertiser

A BLANTYRE primary school’s football team were last weekend booted out of a seven-a-side tournament after reaching the semi-final.

St Joseph’s were among 30 Hamilton primary school teams taking part in the competition in memory of Rangers and Motherwell great Davie Cooper, held at the Palace grounds.

St Joseph’s, one of the favourites for the tournament, won their section and were looking forward to competing in the last stage.

However, they were disqualified over a breach of competition rules concerning squad numbers. It was stated that teams had to have a squad of nine players including two substitutes, but during the early stages of the competition, an opposing coach noticed that St Joseph’s had an extra player on the sidelines.

George MacKenzie of Hamilton Sports Council organises the Davie Cooper tournament.

He said: “St Joseph’s had clearly won the section, then one of the other teams launched a protest to say that St Joseph’s had 10 players in the pool.

“It’s a seven-a-side competition and the rules quite clearly state that there should be a maximum of nine players in the pool, of which seven can be on the park at any one time.

“We had to make a judgement about what should happen, and the decision that we reached was that although they had won their section they had broken the rules, and in that respect, they had to be disqualified.

“Clearly, it was a difficult decision for us to make and St Joseph’s were upset about it, but I don’t think there was any other decision we could have reached.

“At the end of the day, if they have infringed the rules and another team complains about it, then we have no alternative but to uphold the rules.”

Mrs Annie Gaffney’s two great-grandsons, Connor Gaffney and Ryan Cairney, both aged 11, play for the team, and she was fuming at the decision.

She said: “The kids were waiting to go on the park for the semi-final and another coach put a complaint in that there was one extra kid with a strip on.

“Every one of the kids were crying because they were tossed out the tournament.

“The officials said they wouldn’t have minded but because there was a protest they had to act on it.

“Who could do that to kids 11 years of age?”

Connor’s grandfather, Robert Gaffney watches the two boys play regularly and witnessed what happened at the event.

He said: “It’s a Davie Cooper tournament for kids, and you go and watch the kids over the year and get to know the teams.

“The kids were all jumping about celebrating and they went to see where the semi-finals would be played and their coach came back with the bad news.

“Apparently St Joseph’s at one point had 10 kids stripped instead of nine, but they didn’t have any extra boys on the park, just one at the side.

“You can have as many kids at the side as you like, but at one point there was only supposed to be nine stripped and another coach had apparently seen this from the very beginning – but it seems that he waited until his team got beat and then launched the protest.”

He added: “The kids were then told they couldn’t play and were all crying at the side of the park – how can you explain to 11-year-olds that they have been kicked out of a tournament?”