John Fogarty: Why there will be more GAA+ outrage this week
Donegal manager Jim McGuinness. Pic: Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile
In June 2023, RTÉ found themselves in a pickle. What’s new, says you, as the national broadcaster’s woes again occupy the sports pages and the news.
At the time, Ryan Tubridy’s contract was dominating the front of the jacket. At the back, there was comment about which games would be put behind the new paywall built by RTÉ and the GAA.
There was a strong possibility the Galway-Mayo All-Ireland SFC preliminary quarter-final would not be televised. On the weekend of June 23 and 24, RTÉ were scheduled to televise four games, the All-Ireland senior hurling quarter-finals and Tailteann Cup semi-finals. The four Sam Maguire Cup last-12 games were to be streamed on GAAGO.
The attractiveness of the Galway-Mayo fixture stood out. Over 24,000 attended the game in Salthill that Sunday, over twice as many as those that took in the equivalent Donegal-Tyrone game in Ballybofey the previous evening.
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A month earlier, RTÉ and GAA, but particularly the former, had been getting heat about the number of games put behind the paywall of their joint media venture GAAGO. Taoiseach Micheál Martin said all televised championship games should be made free-to-air. The GAA would appear in front of the Oireachtas media committee the following month.
The Central Competition Controls Committee (CCCC), then chaired by GAA president-elect Derek Kent, scheduled the Galway-Mayo game for Sunday (Galway’s hurlers were in quarter-final action the day before). The CCCC advised the Galway-Mayo fixture be offered to Montrose.
It was a gesture graciously received but also demonstrated just how nimble both parties could be. The GAA showed their self-awareness too. Contracts weren’t going to get in the way of promoting the sport.
As commercial partners, it was obviously easier for the GAA to do that for RTÉ. They were two sides of the same coin and making plenty of it – GAAGO brought in almost €5m in revenue that year.
Publicly, RTÉ may still consider themselves partners but it became clear to them and everyone the week before last that the GAA now see them as competitors.
Not only did RTÉ not secure their first choice All-Ireland SFC, Round 1 game, Kerry v Donegal, they were also spurned for their second, Cork v Meath. This Saturday, both games will be shown by GAA+, which is of course now fully owned by the GAA.
There is now a sense RTÉ are playing against the house – and the house always...
Ahead of a new round of media rights deals to be struck next year effective from 2028, there is a fear their 31 championship games will be eroded because they can’t compete with the platform they helped make.
The GAA can say with some degree of truth that this is just business. GAA+, as promising an initiative as it is, is still fledgling and it needs high-profile games to make it a more viable venture, especially as costs have jumped and they may feel they have to justify the jump in the subscription price. But in the last year of their partnership in 2024, GAAGO’s turnover rose to close to €6m and profits of nearly €1m were accrued.
The GAA will point out they are losing money this year. The All-Ireland SFC schedule has been reduced by eight, from 35 games to 27. Ironically, it’s a sleeker format that in time will prove to be an improvement on the group stages. Matches will mean more.
That type of promotion should matter more than the bottom line, but there is a growing belief in the higher levels of the GAA that Gaelic football and hurling are more products than games.
Hurling is a vehicle. Last weekend, there was no game televised as was the case at the start of May last year, while three fixtures were streamed.
With four counties having effectively exited the Liam MacCarthy Cup, there have been five SHC games televised live and nine streamed on GAA+. Some of those wouldn’t have been shown but for GAA+ but that is an imbalance.
Going back to the Sky Sports deal in 2013, the GAA has defended the organisation’s right to seek the best price for its games. As has often been said since, without that international element, the GAA has to be creative with its domestic reach. And it certainly has now, becoming the disrupter in its own media rights market.
There has been some GAA+ outrage the last week and a half. There will be more this week as people realise the repeat of last year’s All-Ireland SFC final, the most anticipated football game of the season, is not on terrestrial television.
And let’s be honest: if it weren’t for the widespread presence of dodgy boxes, the uproar would be heard far and wide. They may be the bane of GAA’s commercial department but ironically may just be what blunts the pitchforks and quenches the torches.
Unquestionably, the pandemic gave us an inflated sense of entitlement about accessing games for free. But some are just too big not to share. Kerry v Donegal is one. And there will be more.
Tipperary and Waterford. Clare and Waterford. Tipperary and Waterford. Cork and Waterford. Tipperary and Waterford.
Groundhog season comes every second year in Munster. You can talk about the yoyo-ing that Roscommon’s footballers do between Division 1 and 2 but just as reliable is the eastern side of the province’s seasons finishing every second May.
Them’s the breaks and as they did before, the two counties will eventually reach the fourth stage of grief and bargain. Speaking earlier this month, Stephen Bennett sounded like he has been there too many times. He saw little demarcation between the province and the All-Ireland.
“Anyone that’s winning an All-Ireland is getting through Munster and if we don’t do it, what’s the difference between losing to them in Munster or losing to them in an All-Ireland series? You need to prove you can beat them.”
Let’s be truthful, the Munster SHC has not been all that brilliant this season. Last year wasn’t so great either up to the final. This renewal of the Leinster SHC has been exciting for entertainment if not reasons of quality.
Sardined like it is, the championship does not allow teams to give the best version of themselves. For the second year in a row, Waterford had a one-week turnaround between their first and second then third and fourth fixtures. The same could happen again in 2027 as Waterford are set to play in Round 1, 2, 4 and 5.
This past weekend, Clare and Limerick guaranteed themselves at least another five weeks of hurling. You can add that to the 43 more week's hurling that perennial qualifiers Limerick have had over Waterford in the format up to this season. That’s genuine summer hurling too.
Waterford are where they are primarily because they haven’t been good enough, but the structure could be a little more favourable to them.
If you do the lotto, you might think about including them in your numbers – 7, 18, 21. The respective number of years Roscommon, Armagh and Westmeath had been waiting for provincial success until these last couple of weekends.
The provinces haven’t had it so good in quite some time. Armagh manager Kieran McGeeney appeared emotional seeing captain Aidan Forker emulate him on the steps of the Gerry Arthurs Stand in Clones, but he was suggesting celebrations would be kept a minimum. They may have made history but Westmeath players were talking about the guaranteed two All-Ireland games they have starting with Cavan coming to Mullingar the weekend after next.
Cusack Park should be as full as Dr Hyde Park is expected to be this weekend for the visit of Tyrone to meet the newly crowned Connacht champions. The Athletic Grounds will be jammed for the Derry clash. The feelgood factor is very real but as McGeeney succinctly put it, everybody is back at the starting line now.
The provinces have provided some romance but the competitions themselves are not strong enough to stand up on their own and were further undermined by the early All-Ireland draw. Winning a provincial title should carry the tangible reward, not simply making the final.
Absolutely, ending famines can’t readily be dismissed. If the build-up to Westmeath’s Leinster final appearance is anything to go by, the celebrations will be memorable. In the grand scheme though, they will be filed away quickly because if they are to truly mean something, they have to be.
