Butler: Start league before Christmas

GAA Hurling Director Paudie Butler has suggested a return to pre-Christmas National League fare after less than 14,000 spectators attended the opening Division 1 fixtures.

Poor weather conditions for the Tipperary-Kilkenny clash on Saturday and international rugby on Sunday played their part in the low attendance figures but Butler believes the competitive hurling season starts far too early.

He said: “The fields are heavy and in early February, the hands are cold. Early in the year, you can get very bad days in February but a couple of league matches before Christmas would buy some time. Many people have been advocating that and you can see their thinking on it. We’re trying to structure everything into the calendar year at the moment so it will take a bit of debate. But when I was growing up, it was the way to go.”

Butler, however, believes that floodlit hurling is going to be a “huge thing” in the promotion of the game in major urban centres. He explained: “Where you have huge population, everybody is available over the winter period. The opportunity is there that we shouldn’t miss for club and underage players to use astroturf floodlit pitches. The floodlit pitches gives us an opportunity to have a very good winter or spring base of hurling guaranteed.”