St Mary’s Basketball Club Castleisland have refuted claims made by their former Super League coach surrounding the sudden disbanding of the team.

When the club decided to pull its Super League side citing a lack of numbers, coach Liam Culloty responded with a statement on Twitter saying that he and his players were “shocked and disappointed” with the move.

"Currently we have eight Irish players from around the county fully committed to playing Super League and we had hoped with the addition of one or two professional players along with some of the fantastic underage talent emerging in the county that we would have a squad more than capable of competing,” Culloty said.

"Alas, we were never given this opportunity to recruit further players to the squad."

Culloty also expressed his dismay that he and his players were notified by text message.

"[There was] no effort made to meet the players and management informing them of the decision before it was released to the media on Saturday. The very least we felt we deserved was the opportunity to fight our corner and see could a solution be found to allow the team to stay in the league."

The club issued another statement this week refuting some of Culloty’s claims, while also apologising for the manner in which the decision was communicated.

“Contrary to what is being portrayed by the statement on Twitter, St Mary’s is a local club and not a county set-up, i.e. not a Kerry team. It would appear from reading the statement that the coach had an ambition for this to be a Kerry set-up, yet this was something that was never brought up for discussion with St Mary’s who were financing the team.

“We are a club team, our first loyalties are to our club and club members. While we are, and always have been in the past, happy to welcome link players in, at no time during recent discussions had any individual player from any part of the county expressed to the club an interest to link or indeed transfer for next season. Conversations had been had with the coach regarding player numbers, the opportunity to recruit has been there since the end of the 2021/22 season.

“A phone call to the coach to inform him of the decision that had been made not to continue in Super League was placed on Friday, June 10. The call went unanswered and was not returned, due to the approaching Basketball Ireland deadline a text message was then sent. However, prior to this, the coach had been aware and involved in discussions and several club meetings were held around the issue.

“The club does regret that players were made aware of the decision by text message. The message thanked players for their dedication over the years and apologised that players were not being met in person. A committee member also phoned all players the following day.

“Team members have since been contacted again, apologised to for being told by text and have been given the opportunity to meet face to face if they wish.”