Duffy criticism over Sky is unfair
When the deal broke a couple of weeks ago I found myself on Prime Time, in a bizarre situation where David McCullagh was quoting from my book GAAconomics: The Secret Life of Money in the GAA.
Specifically, McCullagh was quoting a guest on the show, GAA director general Páraic Duffy (pictured), who’d said: “I could go out tomorrow and Sky will offer us four or five times what RTÉ are offering but I know if I came back to management with that, the organisation would say to me, ‘Get out of here, we’re not doing that’.”
This quotation has been used more than once since, and in different ways, to condemn Duffy as a hypocrite, or worse, which is very unfortunate.
It’s unfortunate because it’s a quote that’s taken slightly out of context.
On the same page Duffy added that as long as 10% of the population didn’t have access to Sky he didn’t think the tolerance would be there for “more than, say, the amount covered by Setanta not being on free-to air”.
I didn’t think Duffy was covering himself then and I don’t think so now. I’d see that reference to Setanta as a statement of fact about tolerance levels within the GAA for pay-per-view, pure and simple rather than an advance inoculation ahead of, well, just the kind of nonsense that’s broken out in the last three weeks.
I’ve enjoyed those Gift Grub sketches about Sky’s coverage as much as the next man, particularly the suggestion that a black card could be construed as condemning someone to death, which is surely how some corner-backs unburdened by scruple see it.
But those sketches also identify an error everybody seems to have fallen into: namely, presuming they know exactly how this development will play out.
I’m inclined to think people will be surprised by the actuality on a number of levels.
For one, take the much-touted, highly-anticipated, non-stop erotic cabaret that’s expected of the good people at Sky when it comes to providing coverage and analysis of (insert names of two unglamorous counties here yourself, I don’t have a death wish).
Can the reality measure up to the expectation? I wonder. It’s entertaining stuff, trying to guess who’s likely to pop up in a Sky studio as a pundit but will the satellite broadcaster be able to reinvent the wheel when it comes to the technology?
There certainly seems to be a pre-existing bias among a lot of people that Sky will “shake things up” when it comes to GAA coverage.
Shake things up how, exactly? In comparison with RTÉ, of course.
I think one service done by the debate we’ve heard in recent weeks is that it has exposed fault lines in GAA attitudes to RTÉ’s coverage of Gaelic games. It’s hardly news that some people within the GAA feel that outside of RTÉ Sport, the national broadcaster can be unsympathetic towards the association, and the Prime Time programme mentioned above, with its robust questioning of Páraic Duffy, is grist to their mill.
Their sense is that many in Donnybrook are not GAA people, to say the least, and that an innate distaste for Gaelic games breaks through every now and again.
It’s not for me to defend RTÉ — it has plenty of press officers to do that — but in the interests of balance I should refer to another contributor to GAAconomics who had this to say about his employer, RTÉ, making a point that many people seem to miss.
“We’re not Sky because we’re not a sports channel,” said Ryle Nugent, head of sport at the channel. “Do we always get it right? No. Is there always room for improvement? Absolutely. Would we be arrogant enough to think we have a God-given right to get the audience to join us? Absolutely not. We have to fight for that like everybody else.”
Nugent’s first point is a decent one: whether you’re into the GAA, medieval chant or the films of Leni Riefenstahl, you’ll always be surprised when other people don’t share your passion.
The trick is to remember they’re not obliged to.
One point raised today (by me) about Páraic Duffy’s comments seems to have been overlooked by everybody in their rush to condemn this deal as the work of Satan, or Mammon, to be more precise.
Namely, if the GAA could once have gotten four or five times the RTÉ fee from Sky, and now, by common consent, they haven’t — Nickey Brennan has suggested Sky’s bid wasn’t too far north of TV3’s, after all — then how can they be accused of selling out?
By the way, don’t think I felt a need to bellyflop into the middle of this imbroglio because of recent activity on Twitter.
If you are not familiar with the social media outlet you may not be aware noted pundit Joe Brolly, or someone doing a fair imitation, unleashed a string of tweets criticising Donal Óg Cusack’s recent column in this paper about TV coverage and punditry. Joe began playing the ball rather than the man pretty quickly, which was of a piece with his remarks about Mayo’s Aidan O’Shea last week.
O’Shea was less than complimentary about RTÉ’s pundits early this week, and Brolly’s response in his magazine column was cutting: “In fairness to Big Aidan, he is still in the early stages of recovery after Fergal Doherty poleaxed him, leaving him curled up on the ground whimpering for his mammy.”
And to think only last week we were talking about kennel blindness!
Joe’s newly found disdain for O’Shea shows he believes the old adage a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of a simple mind. Only last August he was bemoaning cynicism in Gaelic football and asking his readers if they could identify the player who said “cynicism was now part of the game.”
He put the readers out of their agony: “The answer is Aidan O’Shea, who at least has the balls to call it what it is.”
Balls last year but his mammy this year. That’ll learn you, Aidan.
