John Fogarty: Why the GAA had to call time on club games

Beyond social responsibilities, the financial implications were too great for the organisation

Tue, 06 Oct, 2020 - 07:02

So 49 days after they waved a red flag at the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) to come and show their proof, the GAA raised a white one yesterday.

Unable to control post-match celebrations and accepting “a lack of social distancing at certain events” was a problem, the leadership proposed to management committee that they admit defeat and club activities be suspended. With 11 senior finals from 64 still to be played, it wasn’t too considerable a loss but a loss nevertheless.

The GAA had been warned. As president John Horan was informed by acting chief medical officer Dr Ronan Glynn last week, extra compliance to the Covid restrictions and guidelines had been requested. That was relayed through the units but post-match celebrations among other things over the weekend compelled Horan to accept “we didn’t get what we required” from the GAA membership.

“There were issues with the compliance of organising our events, and particularly the post-match events that were going on,” Horan told RTÉ. “We felt we had no choice but to shut things down. The actual games weren't really the problem, it was the post-match element.”

That being said, and as disappointing as the scenes in Blackrock were on Sunday evening, Croke Park must have been aghast not just at how tight the crowd were seated at the Meath SFC final in Páirc Tailteann earlier that afternoon but the size too.

Needless to say, schadenfreude was heavy in the air given the perceived brazenness of that August 18 statement. Given they are all on the same page in trying to bring spectators back to games, the GAA won’t be thanked by the FAI or the IRFU either. But then the latter organisations have had far less fixtures to organise.

Had the county game gone first, they mightn’t have found themselves in such a position. Fewer games would have been easier to control. Then again, the GAA might never have realised that the split season is the way forward. Besides, Croke Park felt compelled to reward clubs who had done so much for their communities when the lockdown was at its most stringent in March and April.

It was ambitious to go with clubs first but as GAA director general Tom Ryan said back in May it was an indication that some semblance of normality had returned. That same sense of assuredness is what both the GAA and Government hope is provided to people when the Championship hopefully commences in 18 days’ time as much as they are unlikely to be able to attend.

Not long after yesterday’s decision, social media was awash with criticism of the GAA that they had in fact jumped the gun in shutting up shop on clubs when the Government chose to move to level three instead of NPHET’s recommended level five. But the decision had nothing to do with that and so much to do with other things such as Public Health.

So often during this pandemic has the GAA actually gone further than what has been expected of them that it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that they made the call they did. When the Government shut down sport on March 25, the GAA closed their grounds completely. When the Government permitted the return of training from June 8, the GAA waited. When the Government allowed the return of games from June 29, the GAA again delayed.

Some will point out postponing club games should have made it sooner given the lack of social distancing at finals going back to last month but as Cork chairperson Tracey Kennedy says elsewhere in these pages today, “Human nature is human nature.” As life-affirming events go, county finals are right up there. Winning them in dramatic fashion, be it for the first time or bridging gaps of 18, 48 or 64 years, prompt feelings that are beyond containing. In this God forsaken year, they sustain hope.

The GAA’s reputation, which Ryan mentioned at the start of the summer is what is high in their list of priorities right now, has taken a bit of a dent as a result of celebrations even though it has largely been out of their control and falls on the individuals doing the toasting.

But other than upholding their status and their concerns about Public Health there were other reasons behind their decision: 15 million more. Along with the Ladies Gaelic Football and Camogie associations, taking receipt of that amount of euro from the Government to help finance the staging of this year’s Championships, there is an additional onus in doing the right thing.

The GAA won’t have forgotten either that they are awaiting news of how much they will receive of the €40m resilience fund ringfenced for themselves, the FAI and IRFU. As the two other sporting bodies go about controlling their crowds with little controversy albeit with much smaller briefs, the GAA couldn’t but pull the reins.

Diarmuid Connolly ambiguous in play and perception

It’s one of the great Only Fools and Horses lines that isn’t often repeated but reading the different takes on Diarmuid Connolly’s career after inter-county retirement last week, it sprang to mind.

Del Boy is after selling off his watch to pay for a Hindu statue which he believes he can sell on for a profit. Asked by the seller what he did with his watch, Del Boy explains he broke it playing volleyball as he swing his left arm. The seller asks, “I thought you were right-handed” to which Del Boy returns: “Me? No, no I’m ambiguous.”

Connolly was ambipedal, not ambidextrous as Del Boy meant to say but the perception of him is certainly ambiguous. You will do well to hear a bad word about him in Dublin where for all his faults and failings, he is idolised as much as Graham Geraghty was by Meath. Outside it and there is an even enough mix of admiration and disapproval.

Yet his top five performances in Croke Park are relatively easy to pick out: the 2014 All-Ireland club final, the 2011 All-Ireland quarter-final win v Tyrone, the 2013 All-Ireland semi-final win v Kerry, the 2014 semi-final defeat to Donegal and 2012’s Division 1 win over Armagh, as he scored 3-3.

Although he was unfortunate not to claim a third All-Star in 2014, it was inconsistency that denied him more. Nothing else. For that selfish decision to take the ball off Ciarán Kilkenny for that sideline kick in the drawn 2016 All-Ireland final which allowed Mayo to develop an attack, there was his sheer conviction to take that equalising free in the 2013 final that Cluxton was on his way up to kick. He gave it both ways, as ambiguous as he was.

In troubling and unprecedented times, winning has to be enough

Not that it matters an iota now but Blackrock had organised a Covid-sensitive homecoming. A one-way system with other restrictions had been put in place at the hurling club with admission to the clubhouse by ticket only. But by the time they got there, the jubilation of ending an 18-year gap was unbridled and social distancing was quickly forgotten.

The club’s social media activities didn’t help, spreading the word just before 6pm on Sunday evening that the players would be carrying the Seán Óg Murphy Cup down Church Road within the next hour.

The close proximity of Páirc Uí Chaoimh to Blackrock made that homecoming all the easier while Charleville thought better than to show off the new Jim Forbes Cup, a trophy appropriately named after one of Cork’s great GAA officials. “Unfortunately due to restrictions it is not possible to celebrate this historic victory in the normal way,” they posted.

In the wake of the GAA’s decision to suspend all non-training activities for club yesterday, the Galway senior champions St Thomas’ and Moycullen had planned for homecomings.

Moycullen GAA club stated: “We had planned for our senior panel to bring the cup on a tour of the parish this evening. However following the statement from the GAA and current COVID-19 concerns, we have regretfully decided to postpone this tour.”

Blackrock are being vilified more so because their celebrations came as it was being leaked that level five restrictions were being recommended. There have been several more like them. This is a time when winning has to be enough.

Email: john.fogarty@examiner.ie