Brakes applied to age rule after Twitter backlash

Central Council is likely to defer the new age rule on inter-county minor teams until next year, GAA director general Páraic Duffy has revealed.

Tipperary club Moyle Rovers’ motion to raise the minimum age from 15 to 16 was narrowly passed at Congress on Saturday, with 68.7% of delegates voting in favour of it.

On foot of a query by Kerry delegate Eamonn O’Sullivan, the top table confirmed the new rule would come into effect in four weeks’ time.

Relayed on social media, news of its immediacy was met with overwhelming opposition as the vast majority of minor panels have already been made.

The motion was also identified as suiting the more traditional counties in football and hurling who can afford not to field 15-year-olds.

However, Duffy later indicated the rule would likely be postponed until 2015 when Central Council meet next month.

“There is a rule that says they can defer implementation and based on the question Eamonn O’Sullivan asked it could be difficult to drop lads who are on panels already. I think Central Council would be very sensitive to that.

“There is an option to bring it in on January 1 next year. If people feel that is the right thing to do I don’t think there would be any problem with that.”

Both Duffy and GAA president Liam O’Neill welcomed Congress’ almost unanimous support for racist and sectarian abuse to be made a red card offence.

“We got an overwhelming majority for that and I’m delighted with that,” said O’Neill. “We wanted to do it for a while. We didn’t trumpet it but it’s a very significant motion. Couple that with the motion [last year] for the black card [in football] for abuse of a player or opponent and also unfair comments to a referee — those we got in first.

“If we can cut out low level abuse that cuts off the conduit to which racism and sectarianism flow afterwards. Cut it out and it’s gone. The combined effect of that will be very significant, but we’ve got the means now by which we can handle it.”

As for punishing racist and sectarian abuse with a lengthier suspension than 12 weeks, O’Neill replied: “It’s like when the government imposes a tax: the only thing in question is it will be discussed again.

“Getting this on the Clár and getting it though was the significant thing. If we find it needs to be upped we’ll go and do that. I’d like to be a bit more positive in the sense that I do think the black card will cut out a good bit of it. You are never going to cut out misbehaviour, but you have to have the means by which you can deal with it.”

Match-based bans will also apply to all levels in football and hurling from four weeks’ time, coming into line with what is already in operation at inter-county level in National Leagues and championship.

“That’s one of the big achievements of this year’s Congress,” stated Duffy, “A huge step forward.”

In his address to Congress, O’Neill revealed €1m will be provided to Antrim, Carlow, Laois and Westmeath in their pursuits to improve hurling in their counties.

“The significant thing here is the control mechanism. We are going to set up committees to control it from the very start. It would be handed to the counties; it will paid for centrally.”

GAA president-elect Aogán Ó Fearghail stated: “Congress is too big a group to make decisions about fixtures. We just need a small group of people, I’d lock them in the bloody room until I’ve got a plan!”

One of the policy debates at Congress centred around the possibility of banning counties from representation in provincial club championships if they don’t finish their own competitions in time.

However, several delegates, including Cork secretary Frank Murphy, voiced doubts about the feasibility of an October 1 deadline.

O’Neill said: “It [the debate] was blown off course by a speaker who took it in a certain line. Had he not spoken at the time he did, it could have made a difference.

“The difficulty with fixtures is everybody wants something done about it but nobody wants to come up with [a solution].”

Duffy also acknowledged a successful Down “home advantage” motion could come into operation in this summer’s All-Ireland senior football championship. From now on, should the qualifiers throw up a repeat of a provincial game the team who won that game will be awarded home advantage. Because of the rescheduling of this year’s All-Ireland SFC, more repeat fixtures will be thrown up.

“It could come more often than in the past, possibly every year,” acknowledged Duffy.

The director general also said he was most disappointed by the failure of the blood sub motion, which entailed providing blood replacements with lettered jerseys instead of numbered ones. Cork PRO Tracey Kennedy spoke strongly against the motion.

“If we’d had it numbers 27, 28, 29, 30 instead of letters it might have gone through but that’s our own fault for that,” conceded Duffy.

“We might have done it better.”