WE NEED TO FIND RIGHT BALANCE...

NEXT Saturday, the GAA’s Special Congress will debate radical options for change in the All-Ireland football championship, particularly flipping the league to summer and running the provincial championships as standalone competitions in the spring. To date, hurling has been far more radical in terms of the All-Ireland race than football has ever been. A tiered championship is long in place. Leinster has opened its doors to Antrim, to Galway, to any team that comes up via the second tier. While it has been tough on Offaly — excluded from the Leinster Championship after being demoted to the second tier and then third tier competition, is it better to have this meritocracy and should football follow the lead of a round-robin championship with more games for players? ‘It’s important not to cloud the Offaly situation with the broader situation,’ says Brian Carroll. ‘Offaly deserved to be relegated on two occasions and had to work their way out — again deservedly — from the Christy Ring. We had to rebuild from the bottom up. In terms of the overall structure, it’s very close to being very right. Look at the breakdown of Leinster, Munster and Joe McDonagh Cup — the Joe McDonagh is a

By PHILIP LANIGAN

fantastic competition with all the teams on the one level. But we have a situation where we probably have nine top teams across Leinster and Munster. Going to six teams in Leinster should help to prevent other teams yo-yoing as quick. ‘It’s hard for them to make the breakthrough and stay up at the level with the other nine.’ So should football embrace Option B which is that league-style championship that gives every county a minimum of seven games? ‘You can hear how excited players are at the prospect of a league being played in the summer. You can say that you don’t want the tail wagging the dog but the players is ultimately what this is about. ‘It gives every team competing in the championship the prospect of competing at their own level. While we all dream of those big championship wins, it happens too infrequently. The statistics back that up.’ ‘The round-robin set-up has worked well in hurling. We’ve Munster and we’ve a Rest of Ireland. Leinster has been very progressive in that respect whereas Munster has been “protect the Munster championship at all costs”. ‘And don’t get me wrong, it is the flagship province but we have to find that balance, too.’