GAA Angry Fans

More and more angry fans are complaining about television coverage of big games.

This could also be down to more fans staying away from the games and preferring to watch them in the – cost-free – comfort of their own homes or their local pub.   Anyway, this week again, there’s praise and criticism in equal measure again for RTÉ and TV3.

Fans’ comments about the continuing poor standard of football this year are linked to more vocal demands for the GAA to take a really fundamental look at the format of the championships, with increasing support for an end to the provincial championships and replace them with  an open draw.   That, in turn, raises calls for the GAA to look at whether or not the admission charge for such games is fair or reasonable.

And even if the GPA go through with their threat – or should that be a promise? – not to do match interviews on telly, it seems like not too many fans will miss them. 

Get in touch:   Give your views and comments to An Fear Rua himself at GAA Angry Fans in ‘The Irish Examiner’    Just drop an email to [e-mail] and get AFR’s reaction to what you have to say.

If you make the ‘Comment of the Week’, we have a fabulous prize of exclusive ‘his or hers’ GAA t-shirts, supplied by our old pals at Puckout.com, where you can design your own club or county leisure wear.

DEAR ANGRY FANS, as a licence fee payer, I feel very aggrieved by the quality of RTÉ’s hurling commentators.   It appears rugby and soccer will always be best looked after by our national broadcaster.  It was very obvious that the TV commentator on the Limerick v Waterford replay was poor at his job and lacked basic knowledge of the game.   The same could be said of the radio commentator on the Dublin v Wexford game on Radio 1.    This was the poorest commentary on our great national game that I ever heard. He sounded like he was commentating on a state funeral.   Rugby and soccer would not settle for this treatment.  Surely there must be some good hurling commentators out there.   Yours in total frustration,

- Ian McDermott

AFR’S SHOUT: We seem to be getting more comments each week about standards of TV coverage.   Maybe more fans are staying at home to watch games on TV because the recession is making them more careful about spending their scarce cash on tickets?  Broadly, I think RTÉ and TV3 both do a good job, that’s why I’ve put your name in the little Black Book, Ian. TV3’s regular on-screen updates of player and match stats is an innovation RTÉ could copy without shame.     But whatever happened to those side line interviews at half time?  I always thought they offered an interesting, honest view of how the opposing camps read the game at that point.