John Fintan Daly: There’s no logic to it, it’s all just optics’
JOHN Fintan Daly, manager of Knocknagree GAA, has had his say on the decision by the government to have all sporting events take place behind closed doors, saying that it feels like the GAA is being “hard done” by the government.
Speaking to The Corkman, the All-Ireland club-winning manager said that the decision makes no sense and there is no evidence to suggest that any GAA activity over the last few months, whether it’s playing or training, has resulted in the virus being spread.
“We feel, and I feel, that we’re being hard done by. I think that it [the GAA] is an easy target to shut down attendance and put it all behind closed doors without any real justification. I just think there’s no justification for it. There’s no evidence at all,” he said.
“There was no recorded incidents that we know of, in all this time back and all the contract tracing, of a case arriving from the playing of a game, either from either playing or training. We have been very, very responsible in the GAA, as you know, in everything that we’ve done since the start of this,” he continued.
Additionally, he said that almost all GAA grounds in the country have the capacity to safely hold a large crowd of spectators even with social distancing measures in place.
“The pure dimensions of a GAA ground, if you go around the circumference of a GAA ground, you could put 200 people in one single line, six/ seven metres apart, all around the grounds, just one line. You could easily social distance 5,000 people at most GAA grounds. We had 200 people, which was better than nothing, but now they’ve even taken that away.”
“There is no logic to what they are doing because on one hand, they say, only 15 people can meet outdoors but as far as I know, it takes a minimum of 30 people to play a match and that’s without any substitutes or managers or referees.”
Finishing up, he said that the ‘ behind closed doors’ decision is one which, to him, looks to be all about just being seen to be doing something.
“I think it’s all just for optics, what they’ve done, to make it look like they’re doing something.