Positive vibes from new camogie Kildare boss David O'Mahoney

Laois man David O’Mahoney was recently appointed new Kildare camogie manager ahead of the 2025 season. He takes over from Kilkenny man Mike Wall, who spent just one-year in charge and navigated The Lilywhites’ first campaign back after their hiatus over player support and lack of facilities in 2023.

“I saw the job advertised and I thought it would be a good fit. I have experience from managing Carlow camogie for three years so I know the division well. I think Kildare is a promising prospect, there are plenty of clubs and players to choose from,” O’Mahoney said.

“They (Kildare) won a Minor ‘B’ All-Ireland last year and Naas have been very competitive this year in the Leinster Championship. A lot of the other clubs are quite strong as well. I would be familiar with a lot of players from my time with Carlow and there is great potential in the group. It is a very young squad with some experienced players too, which I think is promising.”

The 2025 season will see Kildare once again tackle Division 3A as well as the Intermediate Leinster and All-Ireland Championships.

“I would have followed their results over the last couple of years. I always keep a keen eye on the Intermediate Champion-

ship. I know they were probably disappointed with their results across league and a Championship, so the objective will be to be extremely competitive in the three competitions we are in and just make progress on that front,” O’Mahoney explained.

The Portaloise man and former Laois hurler has plenty to contend with in his new position with issues surrounding commitment being hinted at in post-match interviews towards the end of last season.

“They had a big panel last year. There seemed to be a lot of good work done with a lot of players brought through and I am just trying to build on that. The year of hurling with the county will stand to those players and I am hoping we’ll get the benefits of that this year,” O’Mahoney said.

He added that he hadn’t spoken to former manager Mike Wall, but did “talk to other people involved in the set-up so I have a good understanding of what the team was like last year.

“It was my understanding that there were also a lot of injuries last year. Hopefully we can rectify that and get our strength and conditioning in and get the physio stuff right. In regards to getting players committed, I suppose all we can do is create a professional set-up that they are happy to be a part of. Obviously progress and results will dictate a bit of that and I feel if we are making progress we can get the buy-in from the players,” O’Mahoney explained.

Kildare are in good hands with their manager in that regard with the new boss also being a qualified strength and conditioning coach.

He said, “I would have done a lot of that (S&C work) with Carlow. I have that background, but I do have another S&C coach who is involved in the set-up.

“We are hoping to create a very, very hard-working team. Work-rate is the foundation of everything so if you can develop that and get players to buy into it, that would be huge. If you don’t have that work-rate, everything else kind of goes by the wayside.”

The new managers backroom team will include Niall Herbert staying on as the S&C coach from last year, with coaches Colm Cummins, Aidan Flynn, Sean McMullen and goalkeeping coach Paul Sinnott also involved.

O’Mahoney had a three-year stint within the Carlow set-up, but he clarified that his time in Kildare has no fixed term.

He said, “We haven’t really talked about that. There is no real contract, but I’m sure all parties will be looking for a bit of stability.”

When asked if the lack of commitment to a term or project adds pressure on his first year in charge, he responded, “The aim is to be really competitive this year and to make progress. What that will look like will probably be winning a couple of matches in the league. I am going to sit down with the players soon, after the trials, and discuss where we want to bring Kildare camogie on to. We’ll set our goals out this weekend.

“Trails are Sunday (November 24) and then Wednesday and the following Sunday again to have our panel for December.”

So what would represent success for the new man in charge?

“I don't want to say that we are going to win the league or anything. I suppose we just want to progress things further. Kildare didn’t have a good league campaign last year, some of the performances weren’t too bad, but just to get a couple of wins under our belt is the main thing.

“We want to implement a style of play that the players are familiar with and that we can see progression in the matches with the players. That we can see what we are trying to do and see what is coming off and what isn’t. We want to see progress on that front and hopefully that will lead to results,” O’Mahoney said.

The new boss concluded by laying out his ambitions for the year ahead and says he is hoping to build on what was done last year in a mixed bag campaign for Kildare camogie.

He said, “There was good work done last year and they were unlucky in a few games so hopefully this year we are hoping to get that bit of luck because there are going to be lots of close games. The league is going to be tight this year and we will definitely need to get a bit of luck to get over the line in a couple of games.

“We are hoping to create a very enjoyable environment and one that the players feel comfortable to express themselves within.

“We want to create that positive team atmosphere that will make people want to be part of the Kildare camogie panel. That is kind of the main objective I suppose, to make playing camogie for Kildare an attractive proposition.”