GAA must stick with hard line to enforce compliance
U-TURNS tend to get a very bad press but sometimes it’s best to view them through a positive prism: if the original action (or inaction) flies in the face of logic, then there’s nothing wrong with a volte-face. Or even, in this case, taking a stronger and far less ambiguous line.
A week ago, the GAA hierarchy wasn’t planning to punish any counties that ignored the ban on collective inter-county training before September 14.
Seven days later that position has hardened, arising from a conference call of county chairpersons led by GAA president John Horan and director-general Tom Ryan. Better late than never.
It may be stretching things to suggest that a county team will be thrown out of competition if they persist in flouting the training ban between now and mid-September.
But at least there is now the threat of punishment under that catch-all Rule 7.2 (e) dealing with misconduct considered to have discredited the association.
Will this induce a change from those county managers – a minority, it seems, but still a cohort that cannot be airbrushed – who have been gathering their troops in recent weeks? Hopefully, but let’s watch this space.
As the pandemic has evolved and the number of cases here has thankfully reduced, the lexicon of Covid, GAA-style, has evolved too. We have moved from webinars and Zoom calls to anecdotal stories of county squads training in ‘pods’ and allegedly larger gatherings for ‘walkthrough’ sessions, simulating various strategies.
Maybe this could be glossed over or diplomatically ignored before clubs were allowed to resume full-contact training from last Monday. But now the start of the club championship season is only a fortnight away, and clubs deserve full, unfettered access to their marquee county men.
It certainly appears the case that county boards who felt pressurised to turn a blind eye were happier after yesterday’s meeting. It’s understood that a small number of chairpersons admitted their teams had been training, in some shape or form, in recent weeks.
Some of that activity may already have ceased but now comes the litmus test: will a stronger line from HQ encourage 100 per cent compliance from managers over the next six weeks?
In the past, the GAA’s track record for upholding closed-season training bans or restrictions around the timing of pre-championship training camps has been, to put it generously, mixed.
How often has a county been punished for jumping the gun on the start date for pre-season training?
Even when Croke Park turned up the heat on training camps, in 2018, 17 counties were investigated for alleged breaches of regulation but just four found to have a case to answer and three ultimately punished.
Surrendered