ROYALS BOSS: SUPER 8s ‘A MONEY-SPINNING RACKET’

MEATH boss Andy McEntee has hit out at the incoming Super 8 Championship structure, branding it ‘a money-spinning racket’, WRITES DONNCHADH BOYLE.

McEntee believes that club football will suffer hugely as a result of the change.

“I’m not a fan of it,” he said. “(Joe) Brolly or (Colm) O’Rourke was saying it in one of their columns, why don’t you just call it exactly what it is – which is a money-spinning racket. I think it’s a money-spinning racket.”

“It’s fine for those teams that do make it, but what about the other teams? What about club football? The prize for getting into the Super 8s is so good that no county is going to allow club football be played for at least a month beforehand. Why would you?

“The consequences of not making it are so dire and the rewards are so big that you would say ‘I’m not taking any chances, no club’.

“Then if you do make it, no club (football).

“You look at Division 1 and Division 2 in the League, eight teams in each.

“Sixteen teams, four groups of four and there’s your three games. Play every second Sunday, and Championship Sunday would be a big draw for everyone. You play your three games, your top two teams and you’ve got a quarter-final, semi-final and final.”

And McEntee insists the provincial model has run its course.

“Well at some stage we’ve got to move away from the provincial model, because it’s not working,” he said. “I mean, winning a Leinster for Dublin isn’t… they can say what they like but its not what they are looking at.

“The provincial thing is all very fine provided it’s a real competition, and at the moment apart from Ulster, most of them are not a real competition.

“I think the League is a way better competition at the moment, everybody is enjoying it.”