The murky Sky needs clearing
IT WAS expected that Tom Ryan wasn’t going to rattle any cages during his first press conference as director general. So it proved. It looks like he will oversee an evolution, rather than revolution, in his term of office. Those that wanted to see immediate and radical change in the GAA’s approach to their more pressing issues will be disappointed.
There is plenty on Ryan’s todo list — and he referred to many of them on Tuesday afternoon. The GAA need to get more balance in the funding models for coaching and games development.
The total imbalance at present can be illustrated by a few figures. In the ten years, from 2007 to 2017, €16.6million was set aside for Dublin for coaching and games development. In the same period, Fermanagh received just €525,000. If we take one year alone, 2016, Dublin received €1.463m in funding, while Longford got €126,500.
And if Mayo are taken as Dublin’s chief All-Ireland rivals, it is interesting to note that in 2015, €274 was spent on coaching and games development for every registered player in Dublin while only €22 was spent for every registered player in Mayo.
In fairness, the GAA recognise that this is a serious issue. Everyone knows that it needs to be changed. It is just how quickly it should be changed. And how it should be changed. Ryan himself says it is not about reducing Dublin’s allocation, but about bringing the others up. This process appears to have started with the €1m given to Belfast last week.
But counties need to help themselves, too. Dublin came to the GAA with their own plan to re-structure coaching many years ago. I know, for example, that the Leitrim supporters club were willing to help a coaching model in that county by raising funds.
But the complete imbalance in funding for games development needs to be changed — and it has to done sooner, rather than later.
Ryan has signalled that he hopes to tier the football Championship and in that, he is on the same page as new president John Horan. But there is conservatism in the approach as they want the Super 8s to find its own feet over the next three years and then look at re-structuring the Championship and playing a tiered competition in parallel to that.
Any delay in re-structuring the football Championship is not down to headquarters, in fairness. It is down to the fact that some players and counties have claimed they won’t participate in it. There needs to be a touch of reality among the weaker counties. Turlough O’Brien deserves huge credit for his work with Carlow, but I take issue with what he’s said about a tiered structure.
The reason that Carlow have made progress is because they have been beating teams on their own level, and their pathway to progress has been clearly outlined by their promotion from Division 4. Counties need to embrace the need for a tiered football Championship.
The broadcasting rights deal is an issue which is not going to go away. Ryan has been forthright in saying that it won’t be looked at, and the contract is signed until 2021.
I had an open mind about the Sky deal when it first came in. But there needs to be more transparency if the deal is going to be continued to be renewed. At a recent Waterford county board meeting, one delegate posed the question of what benefits have his county seen from the Sky deal. And he was given no answer. That question needs to be answered — for every county.
When Croke Park was opened up to rugby and soccer back in the mid-2000s, there was a clear ring-fencing of the money and this was used for centres of excellence around the country. Everyone had a clear idea of where the funding went — in my own province, we got one centre outside of Knock.
The suggestion is that TV3 offered similar money to Sky at SPORTSFILE the time but the GAA opted for the latter because it could promote the association overseas. Well, the reality is that promotional work is now done by GAAGo, GAA’s own streaming service.
Meanwhile, TV3 have put all their eggs in the rugby basket and ordinary members are still asking questions as to what value they have gained from the Sky deal — and they’re not getting answers.
It is leading to a disconnect between the association and its members. And this is an argument that is not going to die down. If the GAA were more transparent about where the money was going, it might be one way to quell it.
The final issue for Ryan is the GAA’s relationship with the GPA and the conflict between the amateur ethos and the commercial drive of the association. He’s ideally placed to tackle this as he has been finance director for a decade and he is also secretary of his local club in Templeogue.
In the beginning, the GPA made great inroads for player welfare but the big changes this year in the calendar and with the All-Ireland finals going back to August, have been driven by the Club Players Association that the GAA have eyed with a bit of suspicion. It will be interesting to see if that relationship improves under Ryan. It may go some way to finally fixing the fixtures calendar.
Ryan was severely criticised by some pundits for being a number-cruncher and insideman but that was even before he had reached the table, never mind getting his feet under it. That was both unfair and ridiculous.
He has to be given time to make his own mark on the association and it will take a couple of years before we have an idea of his vision.
That is the time to judge him, not before he has even had a day in the job.
Members not getting answers