Letters to the Editor: Hurling keeps on giving — but the GAA and GAAGo keep taking
GAAGo now appears to be replicating the GAA administration of the 60s and 70s, writes one reader. File picture: David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile
It’s not that long ago when executive officers in Croke Park were up in arms at the thought of presenting free-to-air games on RTÉ other than All-Ireland semi-finals and All-Ireland finals. It was generally agreed that no one would attend those games if they were available on TV.
Interestingly, Irish businesses were way ahead of the GAA and the potential of 20- to 30-second advertising slots available at half time in those games during the 1960s and 1970s was not lost on those businesses. On the contrary, the potential of two hours’ free-to-air promotional opportunities available to the GAA from those games never registered with the powers that be in Croke Park and the benefits never accrued.
When eventually the shackles of Gaelic administration were cast off and more championship games were free to air, the GAA had to go ticket-only to cater for the demand. Can you imagine the fiscal and promotional opportunities missed in those earlier years. Similarly in the 1970s, boxing decided to go behind a paywall and quickly lost its place among the general population, so much so England Rugby decided against a similar approach in the mid-80s. Fifty years later we’re at this crossroads again. GAAGo now appears to be replicating the GAA administration of the 60s and 70s.
“Let’s make hay while the sun shines” without a thought on how this organisation grew on the backs of volunteers or simply on how current volunteers’ vain attempts at trying to instil the skills and love of the game in six- and seven-year-olds down in their local pitch without seeing Lee Chin, Pat Horgan, or Tony Kelly go through their artistry at the weekends.
It’s now presented as a balance between revenue and presentation. However, presentation is now seriously suffering in return for the short-term gains a paywall presents. Fifty years on from when our great association had difficulty with promotion, it is now struggling with the concept of presentation.
Croke Park has decided to fight this on the bloody and tenuous battlefields of south Munster with the almost non-existence of Cork hurling in this year’s RTÉ Sports schedule. A county with more GAA than rugby clubs in Ireland will see RTÉ probably broadcasting only one Cork hurling championship game this year after a 12-month spell when there were more rugby games than Pats v Shel’s derbies on the RTÉ schedule.
It’s a case of hurling keeps giving while GAAGo and the GAA keep taking!
Given the split season and tight intercounty timeframe, perhaps it’s best to “begin with the end in mind” (Stephen Covey) — what do we want?
Prior to a short concluding All-Ireland Championship knockout phase, what “regular season” match quantity per county is optimal for an engaging combined AI League Championship (AILC)?
In football, I suggest 12 matches for both AILC Tiers 1 & 2 — modelled on rugby’s URC ‘four groups of four’ 18-match schedule, less the six intra-group ties — with all provincial SFC ‘intra-tier/inter-group’ results incorporated.
Upon conclusion of ‘early season’ provincial SFC quarter-finals, AILC groups could be drawn, with each containing one team from each of four seeding pots, but with no group having both teams from any provincial preliminary round, quarter-final, semi-final, or final tie (as ‘intra-group’ opponents are avoided).
At the conclusion of the 12-match regular season, the Tier 1 ‘top 8 of 16’ from a combined table, advance to an AFL-style “AIC Tier 1 Series” (top 4 with a double chance, ‘2nd 4’ to preliminary quarter-finals).
The ‘Tier 1 bottom 8 of 16’ and ‘Tier 2 top 4 of 16’ could merge to compete in a ‘12-team knockout’ for the “All-Ireland Shield” (four preliminary round losers go or stay down).
The ‘Tier 2 bottom 12 of 16’ could compete in a ‘12-team knockout’ for the “AI Plate” (tier 3 series, all 12 stay down).
I believe a ‘URC-like’ structure would create a ‘fair and exciting’ competition, be allowed ‘to breathe’, and yet have provincial championships embedded in the structure to mitigate political risk.
In hurling, in lieu of the league schedule, the provincial groups could play all ‘crossover ties’ (5 v 6) instead, and along with the provincial championship results, complete an 11-team, 10-match round robin. The ‘top 6 of 11’ and two provincial champions advance to the All-Ireland knockout quarter-finals, with the latter likely earning byes for advancing twice (provincial finalists are still based on ‘4 or 5’ intra-group, round-robin subset results only, no change).
Ms Trainor shows her ignorance of the idea of academic freedom when she says that Academics for Palestine and student protesters arguing for the boycott of Israeli academic institutions are hypocritical. Calling for boycott is itself an exercise in academic freedom. Furthermore, the right of Israeli or Israel-based scholars to academic freedom does not oblige Irish (or any other) academics to co-operate with them. Withdrawing our co-operation is entirely within our rights as Irish academics, and is in no way a breach of academic freedom.
I note that Ms Trainor has nothing to say about Israel’s trampling on Palestinian academic freedom, which in Gaza includes the destruction of 12 universities and the murder of hundreds of scholars and students.
Last week, the Department of Housing, Local Government, and Heritage quietly opened a public consultation and published the Government’s proposed legislation on Seanad electoral reform, which it is being forced to introduce in response to the Supreme Court ruling in Heneghan v Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government from March 2023.
The proposed legislation would merge the current three National University of Ireland Seanad seats and three Trinity College seats into a single six-seat constituency to be elected by graduates of all institutions of higher education in the State.
One institution of higher education would be designated to run those Seanad elections, rather than An Coimisiún Toghcháin — the body currently charged with running local, Dáil, European Parliament, and presidential elections, as well as referendums.
Finally, the proposed legislation would also increase the required number of nominations for candidates from 10 to 60, with an alternative option for candidates of paying €1,800 where they don’t secure the required 60 nominations.
Under the proposal, no one but third-level graduates, local councillors, TDs, and senators will have a right to vote in Seanad elections — with the latter three continuing to enjoy a minimum of five Seanad votes each. Ironically, if Taoiseach Simon Harris were to ever leave politics, he would automatically lose any right to vote in Seanad elections himself.
As the plaintiff who won the Supreme Court case, I reject absolutely this proposal from the Government. It is elitist and petty, and not at all in line with the spirit of the court’s deliberations and ruling. It flies in the face of Tánaiste Micheál Martin’s own position on Seanad voting rights, as well as the position of the entire Green Party.
The public consultation on the Government’s proposed legislation closes in four weeks, on June 14.
The Government needs to cease its contemptuous behaviour towards Seanad electoral reform and instead move to pass and implement the Seanad Bill 2020 which proposes to give everyone a vote in Seanad elections, regardless of educational or socioeconomic background. That legislation could be passed in the space of just four months if TDs and senators in Leinster House truly cared about the majority of voters.
There is a lack of a clear agenda for dealing with our growing electricity requirements and a persistent failure to meet our legal commitments to reduction of our large and growing carbon emissions.
Removal of the Government ban on a public consideration of nuclear energy would allow a countrywide discussion of how a small, but regular and reliable, source of energy could provide us with an adequate support to a growing level of irregular and unreliable wind and solar.
After all the boasting about Ireland’s vast, west coast, offshore wind energy, it turns out that absolutely nothing has been done about it. It is apparently going to be hugely expensive — for customers as well as any wind energy provider taking on this challenge.
It also turns out, very belatedly, that there is no suitable place on the west coast, as yet, to manage the huge work of setting up a system capable of placing the off-shore, floating turbines, and bringing the energy ashore.
Also, of course, providing the means of getting this already excessively expensive energy across the country to where it is mainly needed, for Dublin and the east coast.
