TRYAN TIMES
TIPPERARY manager Michael Ryan has serious reservations about the sweeping changes coming in hurling in 2018.
The most radical revamp in the history of the Championship will see both the Munster and Leinster Championships played on a round robin basis, with a newly created Joe Mcdonagh Cup operating a level below them.
Ryan was speaking in Singapore in his role as manager of the 2016 All-star team, which lost to the 2017 equivalent on Saturday.
“Did Munster need any tinkering with? I would say no. The structure has changed, we’ve got to deal with it. It’s unchartered waters for us all in terms of how we’re going to plan,” he said.
“We would have said the same every other year but in terms of being ready for the 19th of May and the sequence of four games in-arow is hugely, hugely important for us, hugely, hugely important, as it is for the other teams in Munster.
“Two of us won’t survive. The reality of that is pretty stark. Qualifi- ers have been quite generous to us all. There was a second chance saloon for us. This is a round robin, you play your matches and you’re standing up or you’re not. Different proposition.”
The GAA has designated April essentially as a month free of intercounty fixtures but some managers, like Declan Bonner in Donegal and Mayo’s Stephen Rochford, have already indicated that they won’t be releasing players for club fixtures.
Ryan won’t have that luxury with a series of club games fixed in Tipperary in both codes during that month.
It could result in some of his team playing on five successive weekends before he gets a threeweek uninterrupted lead-in to their Munster Championship opener away to Limerick on May 19, which will be the first of four games in as many weekends.
Ryan continued: “The players are quite excited and happy with the prospect of all these games. I’m not sure how wise that is because that volume of games, it’s unprecedented to have that kind of volume of games in quick succession with- out a break. Unless your team [club] is going to get knocked out and with some of the more successful teams the likelihood is they won’t get knocked out.
“We now have a dynamic in Tipp where we have quite a few dual senior clubs and it does present a challenge.”
Moving the All-ireland final forward from its traditional September time slot to August 19 next year doesn’t sit comfortably with the All-ireland winning player and manager either.
Ryan added: “I think it was a mistake. It’s only a personal thing. For me you know I thought the first Sunday is September, that was the All-ireland final day, the culmination.
“I just feel we are pulling it back, and I understand the reasons, that it’s now going to go back to the clubs to get into their own championship.
“Look, something had to give, and I am not anti-change, but I just feel that date in our diary was a fixture and I felt it was the right time to conclude our championship. It will feel a bit unusual.”