Donnelly still backs Interpros

An official attendance of 658 was recorded for the Martin Donnelly Interprovincial hurling final in Nowlan Park on Sunday as hosts Leinster easily fended off the late challenge of Connacht to claim the title.

Given such a paltry crowd, and the lack of television coverage, what kind of return in investment can that represent to sponsor Martin Donnelly?

Is it worth his while at all continuing to put his hand in his pocket to maintain this competition?

“The sponsorship isn’t the issue, the issue is where are we going with this competition,” says Donnelly.

“We had a very good crowd for the football final on Sunday in Armagh, a good game and very well supported. We had a good game in prospect for the hurling final also — personally I’d pay to see Tommy Walsh hurling any day of the week, and all the others too, but timing is everything.

“I didn’t expect any more than we got, to be honest.

“There was a good crowd in Nowlan Park for the game against Munster two weeks ago, then last Sunday you had an even bigger crowd there again, over 10,000 for the Kilkenny-Tipperary league game.

“But on a cold day like we had for the final, with the rugby from Paris on television, and remember Kilkenny always had a strong rugby following going back to the days of WillieDuggan and Ned Byrne — it was probably expecting a bit much to ask people to come out again. I think the TV and the armchair won out!”

Donnelly admitted that some late flexibility in the fixture-making department of Croke Park would have helped.

“There was a big Leinster Colleges game in Nowlan Park on Saturday with two Kilkenny teams, and there was a suggestion that we could have played it in tandem with that, which would have been the ideal. But all these things are decided well in advance, you never know what’s going to happen in the meantime, for example the rugby game wasn’t due to be played this weekend, but it happened.”

Despite the doom and gloom, Donnelly has been inundated with suggestions about how to keep the competition alive.

“I’ve had more suggestions about what can be done, a book of them at this stage! What we need is some kind of working group and give it three years — we need to establish a proper forum to discuss what can be done. I’ll continue to support it, that’s not a problem. I’d be more concerned with setting up some kind of proper structure to examine what can be done. It can’t continue like this, no matter what sponsorship you have it wouldn’t justify it. I think there is a future for it but it needs to be looked at properly.”