The Cork and Waterford camogie squads are considering an escalation of the skorts protest that would see Saturday’s Munster final abandoned should they not be allowed to wear shorts.
Dublin and Kilkenny players all wore shorts during the warm-up to their Leinster semi-final at St Peregrine’s GAA club last Saturday but before throw-in the referee informed both teams the game would not go ahead unless they changed into skorts, as per official match regulation.
The players did eventually return to their dressingrooms and re-emerged in skorts, with Kilkenny ultimately running out 4-11 to 2-12 victors.
However, the result was not the main talking point after the match with the skorts protest generating huge debate.
It now seems certain there will be a further protest this coming weekend unless there is a satisfactory response from the Camogie Association, with the Cork and Waterford squads leaning towards being prepared for Saturday’s Munster final in the Ragg (throw-in 1pm) to be abandoned rather than wearing skorts.
“I can’t speak on behalf of all our players at the moment, because we haven’t sat down and had that vote similar to how Kilkenny and Dublin addressed it last week, but I’m sure we will be looking to take similar action at the weekend,” Cork’s Hannah Looney said on Newstalk’s Lunchtime Live.
When pushed on whether they would change from shorts to skorts if instructed to do so by the referee, Looney added: “I don’t know, I don’t think so at this point, to be honest.
“It would be very frustrating to do that, we’ll just have to see but I think it’s important that we do shine a light to it again this weekend while it’s a hot topic.”
The Irish Times understands Waterford are likely to adopt a similar position with both squads to vote on the matter at training.
In response to the growing pressure, RTÉ reported on Tuesday evening that the president of the Camogie Association, Brian Molloy, is set to bring forward a motion to discuss the matter before the association’s Annual Congress next year.
Labour TD Alan Kelly has already outlined his intention to invite the Camogie Association to appear at the Oireachtas Sport Committee to discuss the matter while Tánaiste Simon Harris has brandished the rules forcing players to wear skorts as “archaic”.
A motion seeking for players to have the option of wearing shorts was defeated at the Camogie Association’s annual congress in 2024, and as a result the issue cannot be revisited until 2027.
However, the protesting players want to force the association to either call a special congress or formulate temporary guidelines that would allow shorts to be worn.
