Kieran Shannon: Kids specialising in Gaelic games too early benefits no one, including GAA

Underage players being part of county development squads is reducing the number of sports those kids get to sample, which the research shows could transfer to and benefit their skills in Gaelic games. 

PITFALLS: The downside of early specialisation in young athletes have never been better known yet it has never been more commonly practised. 

The ironies abound.

At a time when the GAA with its 2030 sports science workgroup and framework is one of the leading research-informed bodies in world sport and its coaches have never been more educated, the more it is flying in the face of some of that science.