Daly calls for football revamp
He has mooted a four-group Champions League-style format in which only 20 counties would compete.
Currently, individual county championships are being shelved for months on end because of the increase in the volume of inter-county games in recent seasons.
Daly has warned that the situation is deteriorating with every year.
Restructuring and restricting the starting line-up in the race for the Sam Maguire would help alleviate the pressure on clubs while also streamlining, what Daly considers an already unwieldy format.
The four groups would be played off on a round-robin system though traditional provincial boundaries would be somewhat blurred.
Five Leinster and five Ulster teams would comprise two groups with one other team from each province joining the four leading counties from both Munster and Connacht in the other pair.
Beyond that, it would be a straightforward progression through to the last eight, four and finally the decider.
The existing Tommy Murphy Cup would serve as a second division for the remaining counties with teams being promoted and relegated between the two tiers year after year and ensuring that every county could still map a path through to ultimate All-Ireland glory. Replays would also be abolished.
“What the GAA needs to do at this juncture is sit down on a strategic basis and work out an effective balance between hurling and football, underage and adult, strong and weak.
“That won’t happen through motions at congress either,” said Daly yesterday.
Daly would also envisage a system where teams play on the same days rather than the staggered calendar adopted at the moment.
He added that the group system would eradicate all the current imbalances which, for example, saw Armagh wait four weeks between their first and second championship matches before then playing two games in seven days.
Daly stressed that, as long as the current provincial structure is maintained, such imbalances will continue. As it stands, he suggested, there are teams competing in the All-Ireland series who haven’t won provincial championships in the past 100 years.
The increase in popularity and exposure the GAA has enjoyed since the back door systems were unveiled is undeniable.
Despite all that, it is still possible to have too much of a good thing it seems and Daly argues that something radical needs to be done to benefit all sectors of the game.
Kerry approach their All-Ireland quarter-final against Mayo this weekend with only three games under their belts while Armagh are still awaiting a date and an opponent for their last eight fixture having already togged out six times.
The fact that Joe Kernan’s men have had to negotiate two replays strengthens rather than weakens that argument as it merely highlights the disparity in the depth of the standards between the two provinces.
But it is the club situation which is causing most concern at headquarters.
“The level of unease among the clubs is increasing all the time, not just in football but hurling too,” warned Daly.
“For example, there has been very little club activity in either code in Clare for the past few months.
“There hasn’t been a ball pucked in about two months in Waterford and two years ago Laois abandoned everything, senior, minor, junior, in football and in hurling when their football minors went on to win the All-Ireland. Even then that went to a replay.
“With everyone you talk to the big bugbear is the fact that players aren’t getting regular games and you would have to say that, as long as we stick with the current provincial system, there’s not going to be any way around that. There is no easy solution.”
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