New rules needed to clean up Gaelic football

PEOPLE would enjoy watching Gaelic football more if it were not quite so robust.

The A&E rooms in hospitals around the country are full of injured athletes over a weekend. Quite apart from the physical pain of injuries, the financial cost is enormous. Players lose working days and wages. Companies lose production. The rules of Gaelic football have two major flaws. The first is that there is no effective way to tackle an opponent. The second is carrying the ball on a solo run, which only invites a tackle. Too many fouls break the flow of play. Thirty fouls in the course of a game are quite unacceptable. The GAA should develop the inherent skills of the game, rather than brute force. They should abolish both the tackle and the solo run completely. Change the rules so that when a player receives the ball, he must immediately get rid of it or try for a score. I submit that the GAA could try out these rule changes in next year's National League. The game would then be a joy to play. It would be much more entertaining to watch. It has the potential to become a major world sport. We must clean it up first.

Michael Mernagh