The Irish Mail on Sunday

BREAK DOWN

Distrust and suspicion are still rife in the relationsh­ip between the GAA and GPA. ‘Super 8’ debacle highlights how players are ignored in a bitter blame game

- By Philip Lanigan

BACK in 2001, UTV experiment­ed with a magazine style show on Gaelic games. ‘End to End’ wasn’t an attempt to subvert the convention­s of TV sports broadcasti­ng, but instead stuck to the familiar format of a run-through the big games of the weekend via panel discussion, along with the hot topics of the time.

One episode was dressed up as a potential ratings winner: a head-tohead between the renegade Gaelic Players’ Associatio­n, still fanning the flames of revolution with Dessie Farrell taking on the Che Guevara role of leading a guerrilla campaign against the establishm­ent and Jarlath Burns, Armagh’s Ulster title-winning captain of 1999 and chairman of the GAA’s response unit, the Players’ Committee.

Anyone tuning in expecting a prime-time bunfight in keeping with the public flashpoint­s that had defined the GPA’s testy early relationsh­ip with Croke Park were to be sorely disappoint­ed. Instead, Burns accepted the findings of an actuaries’ report commission­ed by the GPA into the potential cost of an inter-county career, and the ‘com- pelling evidence that players are out of pocket considerab­ly’.

Rather than sparks flying, it soon emerged that both essentiall­y wanted the same thing: the better treatment of players within the associatio­n’s amateur parameters.

‘I think since we have started to work together,’ concluded Burns, ‘both of our organisati­ons… we are far more coherent. We know exactly what we want and are in a far better way of actually getting it.’

Watching Burns and Farrell’s recent successor Dermot Earley clash on the floor of Congress last Saturday during the ‘Super 8’ Football Championsh­ip debate, there was very little sense that, nearly a full 16 years down the road, the GAA and the GPA are on the same page.

Kevin Reilly’s tweet summed up Congress in less than 140 characters on that defining issue of a Champions League-based format for the All-Ireland quarter-final stage: ‘70pc of players rejected #Super8 proposal, 76pc of delegates supported it. There’s a serious disconnect here .... ’

And that disconnect suggested by the former Meath captain has only come in to sharper focus.

During that key debate, only Cork lined up alongside the GPA and Earley in opposition to the ‘Super 8’ motion, an extraordin­ary scenario given the troubled history of the three strikes on Leeside. The fallout from Congress has been bitter and divisive, Burns just one to point out the critical failure in the GPA’s own communicat­ion process with its members in the run up to the vote.

The overwhelmi­ng sense after the weekend’s events is that the relationsh­ip between the GAA and GPA is clearly one of distrust and suspicion – so why is the GAA paying them €6.2 million per year?

On the Friday night of Congress, Donegal chairman Sean Dunnion raised concerns over extra costs that weren’t accounted for when the new framework agreement with the Gaelic Players’ Associatio­n, to the tune of €6.2 million per year, was signed last July. Set to run for three years, from 20172019, that amounts to €18.6 million.

A feature of that is a guaranteed slice of at least €2.5 million for player welfare/developmen­t services, or 15 per cent of the GAA’s commercial revenue.

And that’s not including the Government-sponsored player grants scheme that equates to €6.9 million over the next three years.

Dunnion’s fears encapsulat­e the financial pressures that it is heaping on county board officials. Is that deal the source of the clear mood of resentment and anti-GPA feeling in the room over the course of the entire weekend? One that fed into the backlash against creating another outside unofficial body, this time representi­ng club players. It’s easy to imagine so.

The cracks revealed by Congress represent not only the first major test for Earley but raise far deeper questions.

What is the point of official recognitio­n – granted since 2010 – if this is how the GAA and GPA do business on such an important issue as only the second major change to the All-Ireland Football Championsh­ip in the history of the associatio­n?

Twelve months earlier, the GPA had no say on structural reform at Congress because the GAA quietly buried their own comprehens­ive document, on the principle of ‘no extra games’. Yet the ‘Super 8’ will feature eight extra games.

How do you sign off on a deal worth €18.6 million and then not take a consultati­ve approach on Championsh­ip reform? Or a consultati­ve approach pre and post Congress to ensure all stakeholde­rs don’t take a public kicking?

That the GPA served its members badly with a disorganis­ed approach on such a substantiv­e issue is valid; that the GAA continue to treat the players as if their opinion merits no more than the likes of Middle East delegate Patrick Moyna, who spoke in favour of the ‘Super 8’, is mind-boggling.

Reilly’s tweet summed up Congress in less than 140 characters

How do you sign off on €18m and then not consult on major reform?

That the GPA received the green light to bring a motion of their own to Congress in the future summed up a day of mixed messages.

In what other business arena would one body hand over a cheque for over €18 million in funding to another and not accept that they are a major stakeholde­r? And treat them as such? Then, on Friday, the truth of Dunnion’s fears became apparent: turns out the hidden costs of the new GAA/GPA deal could run to €750,000, pushed up by the likes of increased gear allowances. That would bring the cost close to €7 million. Per year.

‘Issues have arisen,’ admitted GAA director general Páraic Duffy Duffy a week previously, addressing the linked issue of inter-county team expenses, which topped a staggering €23 million for 2016. ‘We can’t afford to spend €23 million as an organisati­on… I know counties are concerned about the cost of inter-county teams.’

Agree or disagree with the main motions passed at Congress – and important motions to clear a greater window for club players and protect young players were voted on – but it’s been a PR disaster. An ‘annoyed’ Duffy responded to the twitter eruption by so many high profile players – past and present – not to mention talk of ‘all-out strike’, with a pithy comeback: ‘We’re not going to run the GAA by Twitter.’

Delegates, volunteers in the main, found themselves hammered for taking part in a democratic vote.

The GPA was then forced into a public statement because of the flak they were taking over not serving their members better, only coming out publicly against the motion just days before the vote when delegates already had been mandated.

How can a public backlash on all fronts serve the best interests of the associatio­n, or the players’ body? How is that a way of doing business? Because the figures involved make it big business. How is that a sustainabl­e partnershi­p?

Maybe, like a former celebrity ‘A-list’ couple, one half of which will headline Croke Park in July, it’s time to ‘consciousl­y uncouple’. Cold play all round. There are no winners in the current blame game.

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 ??  ?? DIVIDED LINES: GPA chief Dermot Earley (left) and GAA director general Páraic Duffy; Last year’s All-Ireland final (inset)
DIVIDED LINES: GPA chief Dermot Earley (left) and GAA director general Páraic Duffy; Last year’s All-Ireland final (inset)

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