Congress to hear plan to end dreaded six-day turnaround

A motion abolishing the six-day turnaround for beaten provincial football finalists will be put forward at Congress in Derry next month.

However, the same proposal has wide-sweeping repercussions for the structure of the Championship in both codes as the national fixtures planning committee attempts to streamline the GAA’s summer calendar from 2014 onwards.

While the hurling championship rescheduling does not require a rule change, a rule change is required to alter the football competition as the two sides of the qualifier draws would be linked to the two sides of each provincial championship. While four weeks will be the maximum wait for any team between games, the new schedule would halve the amount of counties a football team can potentially meet in the qualifiers. Where they are drawn in their provincial championship will dictate what side of the qualifier draw they would enter.

Each round of the qualifiers would then be played over two weekends. Using last year’s football Championship as an example, beaten Munster semi-finalists Kerry and Limerick would be divided into either side of the qualifiers and play their backdoor games one week after another.

Gone will be the possibility of a provincial final pairing repeating in an All-Ireland final decider as the losers are drawn in a qualifier on the same side of the draw as the winners’ All-Ireland quarter-final.

Such an occurrence has taken place just once since the introduction of the backdoor in 2001 when Kerry beat Cork in the 2007 All-Ireland final having also been victorious over them in that summer’s Munster decider.

However, as the qualifiers are being split, the proposal creates more potential for repeat fixtures such as counties meeting in the qualifiers having already played each other in the provincial championship.

There would be ramifications for the GAA’s broadcasting rights deals too as some qualifier weekends could be overloaded with attractive fixtures whereas the following weekend mightn’t provide anything similar.

From a county perspective, the motion is aimed at providing boards with a more predictable calendar to plan their club fixtures.

GAA director of games administration and player welfare Feargal McGill pointed out the motion is a response to counties’ pleas to find more free weekends in the summer to play club games. However, he warned that if the motion passes, its success in operation depends solely on county boards scheduling games for the time that has been freed up.

“It will be worth doing as long as counties use the time it creates to play extra club games,” insisted McGill. “If they don’t use that time, then it’s a waste of time. That’s the key. Counties have to ask themselves if they are going to do that. There are other benefits such as getting rid of the six-day turnaround.The CCCC are reasonably happy with the proposal but we would point out that while it does solve some problems, it will create others.

“It will cause difficulties in scheduling — there’s no point in pretending it won’t — but having said that, it may well be worth passing. It’s a matter for Congress now.”

Since 2001, just two teams — Dublin and Down — have won qualifiers six days after losing provincial finals.