Duffy a fan of Team Ulster proposal

GAA Director General Páraic Duffy believes a Team Ulster competing in the All-Ireland championship would be “brilliant” for hurling.

Speaking exclusively to the Irish Examiner, Duffy questioned the purpose of competitions like the Munster and All-Ireland intermediate championships and even the Christy Ring, Nicky Rackard and Lory Meagher Cups because, in his view, they’re failing to adequately promote or develop the game.

But something he thinks would positively transform hurling is the idea of a Team Ulster as floated by Donal Óg Cusack on The Sunday Game last month.

“I definitely think a Team Ulster is well worth considering. When Galway can go into Leinster, why can’t a Team Ulster? I think it would be brilliant,” Duffy said.

“At the moment hurling in Ulster is finding it very tough. Antrim I don’t think are punching at their full weight. Derry and Down have probably gone back to where they were 15 years ago. I’d love to see the Team Ulster concept being looked at.”

Cusack’s proposal has proven contentious on the issue of whether or not Antrim would be included in, and agreeable to, a Team Ulster selection. Duffy, however, believes that dilemma shouldn’t roadblock the concept and believes it would work best without Antrim’s involvement.

“If you were to put in a Team Ulster into the senior championship, with or without Antrim, it would promote and develop the game. Ideally it should be without Antrim.

“Antrim should be good enough to be able to stand on its own two feet. Okay, it’s a small county but they should be at least as good as Offaly for example. So let Antrim stand alone and then let the other eight teams come together for Team Ulster. That’s where everyone should be aiming to get to. That would make absolute sense for everyone.”

At the moment the association’s chief executive feels too many competitions do not make enough sense.

“If you look at most [adult inter-county] competitions, outside the senior championships and the top two divisions [in the league] most of the games are run at a loss.

“Competitions like the Christy Ring, Nicky Rackard, Lory Meagher are completely subsidised by us [Central Council]. The lower-tier leagues are the same. My own view is that every competition should provide one of two things: it is promotional or developmental. In other words it either raises the profile of the games or it develops the games in some way.

“If you apply that across the board we are running competitions that don’t meet either of those two criteria.

“The junior [inter-county] football championship doesn’t promote the game. They won’t like this in Munster but the intermediate hurling championship is the same. People can argue it gives fellas a chance to wear a county jersey but by and large it’s not promotional or developmental.

“And I think you have to wonder the same about the weaker-tier counties in hurling. I’d include [his own county] Monaghan in that. You’re drawing from a very small base of players, only five or six clubs, yet the costs of preparing those teams is significant and I don’t see any promotional or developmental value in it.

“We have the three finals here [in Croke Park] — the Christy Ring, the Nicky Rackard, the Lory Meagher — and teams like Longford and Sligo have won some of those but has that really contributed to the development of hurling in those counties? You can convince yourself because they play a game and win a final in Croke Park that somehow it’s helping hurling in the county. I don’t think that it is.

“At the moment we’ve got about 14 counties — at a stretch — that are playing the game at a decent standard and the big challenge for us is to make sure we keep those at or above that level. With the other 18 counties, you’d really have to wonder is the inter-county model the right one for them.

“That’s why I would be very open to a Team Ulster. You could have it [a team] in the rest of Connacht. A Team Ulster and a Team Connacht? It would be fantastic. I think you’d be better off investing in two teams like that and say that we’re going to do this for 10 years and put the very best people around those teams.

“Obviously you’d need to roll out the same model at underage as well. You’d love to see a county board pushing the idea.”

- In tomorrow’s Irish Examiner’s Big Interview, Paraic Duffy speaks about the future of the International Rules, the financial troubles of clubs and counties, the limitations and frustrations of his role and his native Monaghan’s Ulster breakthrough.