8 October 1997
Lacken take step closer survival
Lacken United ...................... 3 Castlebar United ................... 0
Lacken United moved a step closer Premier Division survival with a comprehensive victory over doomed Castlebar United on Sunday.
A hat-trick by Brian Forde was the highlight of the Lacken victory.
A win over Claremorris next Sunday is likely to save the North Mayo side >from the drop, but Claremorris are also battling against relegation.
Forde opened the scoring after half an hour and increased the margin before half-time. He completed the rout fifteen minutes from the end.
Castlebar United played the match with just ten players.
Lacken United: P. O'Boyle, E. Keigher, J. Lavin, P.J. Horan, D. Lavin, O. Clarke, J. Clarke, D. Loughrey, B. Horan, B. Forde, P. Tighe.
Castlebar United: J. Redmond, B. Roach, G. Downes, D. McEllin, L. Coyle, K. Redmond, O. Roach, B. Walsh, V. Maye, J. Gannon.
Ref: H. Loftus (Castlebar). * Star Rating: Brian Forde. . .hat-trick hero.
League's unprecedented clampdown on rule breakers
By Tom Kelly
An unprecedented clampdown on illegal and unregistered players has been undertaken by the Mayo Association Football League.
In what is regarded as a brave step by the league to clean up aspects of the sport, six clubs have had points deducted as well as being substantially fined. A further three clubs have been heavily fined following an extensive investigation carried out by the league's B team monitoring committee.
The hardest hit of all was Westport United. The club's A team lost 11 points from serious breaches of the rules. The action could result in the side being relegation from the Premier Division. United's B team was fined and had a total of 13 points deducted from them.The announcement will come as a shattering blow to United who committed a total of 47 violations of the rules. One Westport player played illegally for the club on 18 separate occasions.
A significant portion of the action was taken against the club for their failure to observe the B team ruling. Any player who is registered with the A team or has played more than 5 A team games is deemed to an established A team player for that season and cannot play for the B team unless he is regraded by the Mayo League's management committee.
Division Two side Castlebar Celtic B team were fined and had seven points deducted. The monitoring committee discovered that a leading official of the club played in three matches without being registered.
Claremorris B team were fined and had six league points removed from their tally. One player turned out for the side illegally on seven different occasions.
Fines were imposed on Conn Rangers for breaches by their A and B teams. Three points were also taken off both sides.
Newport Town lost three points and were fined.
Swinford were fined, and two points were deducted from the A team.
Fines were also imposed on three other sides without points being removed.
They were Erris United, Straide & Foxford United B team and Urlaur United.
It took the league a number of weeks to plough through the evidence which had been uncovered by the three-man monitoring committee.
On the positive side, the investigation underlined that the vast majority of clubs playing in the league were abiding by the rules, and the management committee had no hesitation in hitting the offenders hard.
