GAA: The Offaly County Board is bracing itself for some tough negotiations with its senior football panel in an effort to restore their services for the coming season. Ian O'Riordan reports.

Yesterday, the players issued a statement announcing the withdrawal of their services with immediate effect, the direct result of the county board's apparent failure to properly support manager Gerry Fahy for another season.

Coupled with the announcement that Mike McNamara would not be seeking reappointing as senior hurling manager, the challenges now facing the Offaly County Board won't easily be tackled.

It all stems from a tumultuous Monday night when the county board lost both senior managers and a senior panel within the space of an hour.

The players' withdrawal of services is not just some random act of support for their manager, but rather an all-out strike - at least on a par of what the Cork hurlers called in late 2002.

The statement announcing their course of action was released by team captain Ciarán McManus, who has also sought the advice of certain Cork hurlers that drove their strike for better treatment from the county board.

Unlike the Cork situation, however, the Offaly footballers are primarily concerned about the treatment of their managers: "Regrettably, we feel that we have been left with no choice, but to withdraw our services for the coming season," read the players' statement.

"The callous treatment and lack of support for outgoing management, previous management, and players, from the Offaly County Board for the last number of years has unfortunately brought us to this decision.

"This is a heart-breaking decision for this panel of players as we are, and always have been, 100 per cent committed to Offaly football."

Fahy had called a meeting with his football panel late on Monday evening in order to discuss the situation that he and he two selectors Matt Connor and Mark Plunkett had found themselves in after the most recent meeting of the Offaly County Board.

A week ago, the county board voted 27-26 to ratify Fahy's management team for a second term. That followed a slightly more favourable vote of support (20-16) from the football club chairmen and secretaries at a review meeting late last month. But Fahy had every reason to view that as vote of no support.

"Every manager relies on support," he said yesterday. "I don't think you can survive without it. The required support just wasn't there for us, and that was clearly indicated by the vote. So there was no other call we could make on it."

Fahy had discussed the implications of the situation with both Connor and Plunkett over the weekend, and together they agreed their positions were untenable: "We make decisions collectively and stand with them collectively. So we were in total agreement on this. It's a very and bad situation, but if you believe in something strong enough then you have to stand up with courage and convictions."

Fahy, however, made no attempts to influence the players' course of action in any way.

"We met with them last night (Monday), more out of courtesy, and to bring them up to date with exactly what had happened, and to inform them of why we had reached the decision we had. We left them then because they had their own business to discuss.

"It was only today when I learnt that they'd issued a statement withdrawing their services. Certainly that's something I'm very saddened to hear, that it's come down to that."

Reaction from the Offaly County Board has been slow in coming. County press officer Pat Teehan indicated the board was willing and eager to talk with all parties as soon as possible, and that a special county board meeting had been called for tomorrow evening. And, for now, Fahy wasn't ruling out the idea he would return if some sort of compromise could be reached.

"I don't think anyone should ever say never," said the Galway native. "If you have a genuine interest in Offaly football then everyone should do their very best now to try to deal with the issues that have been presented here."

In a separate meeting on Monday night, McNamara met the Offaly club delegates to discuss his future as the county's hurling manager.

After a two-hour meeting, McNamara decided he too wasn't assured of the support he needed, and early yesterday told the county board he would not be seeking a third year in charge.

Offaly's Management Committee then announced they would meet this week to appoint a committee to make a recommendation to the county board on the appointment of the senior and under-21 hurling management for 2005.

In another development yesterday, the Tyrone County Board announced that football trainer Paddy Tally has decided not to work with manager Mickey Harte for another season.