15 pages of great local sports action

AN old boss of mine was a great one for the business lingo: running flags up flagpoles, throwing babies (or not) out with the bath water, and keeping the ducks in a row. Another favourite of his - when a tricky problem arose - was the clarion call to “try to cut the baby in two while keeping it alive” (I know, me neither!). Anyhow, that particular phrase came to mind this past week with renewed talk of a split season in the GAA.

It seems one of the side effects of this Covid-19 pandemic from a GAA point of view is that the GAA season (it’s more a 12-month long rolling year than a season, isn’t it?) is that it has set in train what seems to be a real appetite for a properly split season, one half of the year for club fixtures and the other half for inter-county action. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean January to June for one and July to December for the other, but there does now seem to be a genuine appetite for a much clearer division of the calendar for club and county action.

In theory and in simple terms it seems a very fine idea: let the clubs do their thing with their ‘county men’ unhindered by inter-county games and training, and when that’s all done and dusted, let the county players at it without feeling like they’re turning their backs on their club for large chunks of the year.

In reality and in practice, cutting the GAA season in two and keeping it alive might be a whole lot more difficult.

Already it seems like it won’t be a simple six straight months for you and then six straight months for me. It’s more likely that the club game will get small part of the start of the year and then a chunk of the back end of the year, with the inter-county ‘season’ sandwiched in between. Whatever your stance on the club versus county debate, and whether the 2% of inter-county players should dictate when the 98% of club players should play, it seems logical that the inter-county season should be played over the best part of the year, i.e, the summer months. After all, is the Irish summer is synonymous with ‘the Championship’ and vice versa, and aren’t the county championships (or county finals at any rate) synonymous with October and November, and why should that really change.

The problem, however, as many foresee it, is that the proposals being put forward by the Gaelic Players Association, the Club Players Association, and probably the GAA itself - through its own Fixtures Calendar Review Task Force - may well see the All-Ireland football and hurling finals played by the middle of July. And one has to ask if we really want the inter-county season over before the August bank holiday weekend?

For most counties in both codes their season is over before the start of August, but just because the majority of counties are already out of the running for the Sam Magiure or Liam McCarthy Cups by mid-July, that doesn’t mean all those counties - players and GAA followers therein - switch off from the Championship.

Twenty years ago the All-Ireland semi-finals in August and the All-Ireland Finals in September held a country in thrall; more recently the All-Ireland quarter-finals made for some very decent viewing on the August long weekend, and more recently again the Super 8s - some dead rubbers aside - were a welcome addition to the calendar as the evenings began to draw in.

This observer had no great issue with the All-Ireland Finals being pulled back a few weeks, as they were a couple of years ago, and we don’t fully subscribe to the fear that the GAA is conceding promotional time to rugby or soccer or any other sport by shortening the inter-county season by a couple of weeks. The GAA and GAA people should be confident enough in their own sport - we dare not say ‘product’ - that they can let it lie idle for a few months without fear that everyone is going to turn rogue and be lost to rugby or soccer or anything else for that matter.

The question, however, is this: do we really want to see the glitter and tinsel explode over Croke Park in the middle of July and then not see another inter-county match until the following February?

Club football and hurling is great, but it’s really only great for the clubs involved on any given day.

W ith the exception of a few county finals - when some exceptional players are in action - than draw in outside crowds, most club matches are very parochial affairs.

We know from attending countless club games around Kerry and then beyond that into the provincial and All-Ireland stages of the Club Championships - at senior, intermediate and junior level - that they really only appeal to the people of the parish.

The All-Ireland Intermediate and Junior Club Championships have been a great addition to the GAA calendar, and obviously Kerry clubs have enjoyed plenty of success in them. The All-Ireland Club finals in Croke Park are brilliant days for the clubs that get that far, but the simple reality is that beyond that, no one is really interested.

Even go as far as the All-Ireland Senior Club Championship. Plenty of people will tell you that Corofin have dominated that competition in recent years, they will probably tell you that Nemo Rangers have won a good few titles, and you’re fairly well informed GAA man or woman might even know that Dr Crokes and Crossmaglen and St Vincents and Ballyboden St Endas have collected the Andy Merrigan Cup in the last 10 years, but could they list, year by year, the St Patrick’s Day finalists from the last decade?

We doubt it, not in the way almost all GAA people could tell you what county won the Sam Maguire Cup or Liam McCarthy Cup in any given year since 2000 and who they beat in the final.

If inter-county All-Ireland champions are as familiar to us as US Presidents, then All-Ireland club champions are vice-presidents: their names are somewhere in the back of our minds but we’re not sure who they served or when.

There’s no doubt there are issues with the GAA calendar, and a great separation and clear lines between club and county fixtures is needed.

If one good thing comes out of this pandemic it will be that the GAA sees a new way of looking at everything it does, from how the Association is financed to how teams train and prepare for games, and a greater appreciation of what’s really important in the grand scheme of things. Included in that, hopefully, will be a better clarity with regard to the games calendar, and alleviating the pressure on players, managers and county boards to be all things to all masters.

If that means tearing up the masterplan as we know it now and starting completely afresh then so be it. Indeed, it might be the only way to properly and fully address the ongoing flaws in the system.

If that means having the inter-county season end completely in mid-July then so be it, but is striving for a split season, the powers that be need to be careful to keep the baby alive while cutting it in two.

The GAA calendar is, for sure, in need of a complete makeover but it’s crucial that the baby isn’t thrown out with the bath water, whether that’s half a baby or the entire child.