As we come to end of another season it is time to look back and reflect on our successes and challenges albeit as we look forward with excitement to the coming season. Football wise at a senior level it was a very successful year. The senior 1B side achieved promotion back to 1A, the Saturday Major 1 side consolidated their place with a fine 6th place finish in a very competitive league and the Sunday Division 3 side also had a fine season with a 4th place finish. Next season will see the club enter two Saturday teams and one Sunday team in the Leinster Senior League. The second team on Saturday will be made up of players from our under 18 Major team who won their league last week and some of our younger players from last season. The success of our teams last season plus our top class facilities has resulted in huge interest from players outside the club wishing to join. This is what we need to ensure ongoing success at all age groups and the ability to field competitive teams at senior level.  Our senior ladies have just started their summer season and we wish them well over the coming months and our over 35s have also just started their season and are keen to add to the cup win they had last season. 

On the underage side whilst we were competitive in a lot of leagues we also found it very difficult to compete in some of the top divisions. As already stated our 18 Major team won their league when they defeated Tolka Rovers in a playoff and we won two cups at 11.2 and 11.9 boys but success for other age groups was limited. Our 14 Premier side made it to the final of the All Ireland trophy competition but were beaten by a very late goal and our 16 Premier side also were beaten by eventual winners Shelbourne in their All Ireland cup semi-final. 

The issue in our case is the fielding of multiple teams in our older age groups. In many cases we are putting out two and three teams while most of our opposition are only fielding one team and ensuring training is focused on this team alone. This is an area we will have to look at going forward. We try to run a pyramid type system whereby we have 3 to 4 teams starting off in the under 8s and 9s before reducing to 2 to 3 11 a side teams in all age groups. The training slots as a result are starting to become a big issue and we will need to see what solutions might work for us including limiting training sessions for some teams. We will provide an update on this approach in coming weeks.

Our girl’s football continues to explode and the numbers are increasing year on year. It is hugely important to keep the girls playing right through their teenage years and playing at their correct age group will help with that. We know both boys and girls face big challenges as they combine school work, exams and other sports activities. The burden of this can sometimes mean difficult choices have to be made. There is no doubt making these choices early can help both the player and the team, difficult as that may be for all. Most of our teams have been competitive in all their leagues and next season we will field teams in every girls group from 8 to 18 except for under 16. I do expect more our girl’s teams to be challenging for league titles in the near future and more of our girls to be involved with the ETP. 

Our partnership with Shamrock Rovers was announced earlier in the year and we have already received extremely positive feedback for the Easter camps and pilot training slots. This partnership will be of great benefit to our club especially the support with our coaching and the opportunities for our players to train with Rovers coaches. We continue to seek supports for our existing coaches and we are always on the lookout for more coaches to join the club. We are currently in discussion with a highly respected coach to support our Coach the Coaches initiative. This scheme aims to help our coach’s further increase their expertise and I hope to make an announcement shortly in this regard. I must also mention Roger Smith who has worked extremely hard over the season with some of our Premier teams and their results certainly showed the benefits of Roger's hard work. 

As usual the mini leagues were one of the highlights of our year. This being the 50th anniversary Robbie Martin and his committee really pulled out all the stops to make it the most successful mini leagues ever judging by the feedback we have received. There is an enormous amount of work put in beforehand to make it run like clockwork and once again anyone who feels they can help please let us know.

2026 will see the start of the next uplift of our facilities. We launched a new annual draw to help fund our new club house and the bonus draw was quite successful in selling a decent number of tickets but obviously we need to sell most, if not all of the 500 tickets to fund the building so if you have not already purchased a ticket please consider doing so. There are a number of options when purchasing a ticket, either a straight £100 or 4 monthly £25 payments. The new clubhouse will be a huge addition to our already first class facilities and we hope to commence work soon but I can confirm our planning was approved.

Going forward we must endeavour to match our facilities with improved levels of performances on the field and while that will be a challenge I firmly believe if players and coaches dedicate themselves we will be successful. 

Personally I wish to thank and commend our executive committee for all their hard work and help over the last year. Big thanks also to all of our coaches for your superb efforts and input over the season. I aim to continue on as Chairman with your support for one more year and we continue to improve all aspects of our terrific club.

Many thanks

Paul Martin
Chairman – Leixlip United Football Club