Dergview: Darragh Park flooding highlights stadia issue - Canning

Darragh Park, the home of Dergview, was submerged after Storms Dudley, Eunice and Franklin

Dergview manager Tommy Canning says the flooding of Darragh Park highlights the issue in the delay of stadia funding in Northern Ireland.

The NI Executive committed £36m for sub-regional stadia funding in 2015 but that money has yet to be released.

Dergview's pitch and training pitch are under "one or two metres" of water after several storms.

"When things like this happen you worry about it happening again and again," said Canning.

"How many times would you get away with it before you face a situation where your ground would no longer be viable?"

• Hargey meets with NIFL & IFA over funds

Following the collapse of the Northern Ireland Executive at Stormont, Communities Minister Deirdre Hargey has met with the Northern Ireland Football League and the Irish FA to discuss the sub-regional stadiums funding plan.

The minister said earlier this week the funding has not been shelved and her department's proposal is "ready to go" and is ready to "progress this project to the next stage".

The delay has been widely criticised in the local football community and Canning believes the heavy flooding at Darragh Park is a stark example of why the funding is required.

"You would think that football clubs like Dergview would be high up the list of priorities to need financial assistance to stave off the threat of a football club losing its complete home ground," he added.

"I think there is a bit of rhetoric around 'why do you need money when you can spend 'x' amount of money on a player?', and that has shifted the focus somewhat from the reality of the situations that clubs like Dergview are facing."

Tommy Canning became Dergview manager in May last year

With alarming pictures of Darragh Park submerged, comparisons have been made to fellow Championship club Institute, who were forced from their Riverside Ground after flooding in 2017 after Japanese Knotweed developed and facilities were heavily damaged.

"The worry is, you look at clubs like Institute and the difficulties they continue to face," added Canning.

"There is a real need for improvement of infrastructure. This is a real-life example. We had two serious-enough storms, but there hasn't been a huge amount of rain and it looks like it has done a serious amount of damage.

"The stadia funding is huge in the sense that the funding comes from the department of communities, and Dergview is a cross-community club and we are situated right on the border, so it gathers a lot of community focus.

"Hopefully that is not lost in the current stalemate."

Too early to assess damage

Canning added it was too early to say the damage caused after the River Derg burst its banks.

Darragh Park had previously flooded in August 2016 but that was due to flash flooding after "a freak amount of rain" rather than issues from the neighbouring river.

"That disappeared as quickly as it came, but this is more worrying because it is a situation where a river has burst its bank," added Canning about the flood in 2016.

"We're in wet season and the forecast is not great, so it looks like this is going to cause more damage."

Dergview invested in improving the surface at Darragh Park in pre-season last year and a training pitch was set to be used for the first time later in spring but is also heavily submerged.

"The worry is that all of the good work that has went on will be lost," he added on the training pitch.

"There could be huge financial loss in terms of that, but it is hard to assess the damage at the minute.

"Lucky enough it hasn't entered the club house, although it has come very close to it. It's hard to assess the complete damage but there is stuff floating about everywhere up there."

Fixtures could be hit

The club are set to have three home games over the next 10 days, including a North West Senior Cup final defence against Ballinamallard United.

Canning has led his players to an impressive campaign and they remain in the hunt for a top-half finish, and they also narrowly exited the Irish Cup at the hands of high-flying Glentoran in January.

"We just hope everything is ok. We want to be in that situation where we can host high-profile games. Dergview have been in the Championship for a long number of years now.

"That is where we want to be for now at least, and things like the pitch being flooded can be a threat to that."

Liverpool and Northern Ireland defender Conor Bradley is from Castlederg and sponsored Dergview's Irish Cup game with Glentoran

Along with Darragh Park, a lot of the the County Tyrone town Castlederg has been heavily hit by flooding and Canning says the entire community has been hit.

"We're not one of the biggest clubs in the country but we are very much community-based. The club means a lot to a lot of people," he said.

"It becomes a social gathering and somewhere people meet from week to week.

"There are also people who have invested their life in the club and I am sure they are very anxious, concerned and worried.

"One thing about Dergview is people will do all they can to rectify the immediate situation but that's not the issue. The issue is long-term and the fear of this returning again and again."