McKenna the GAA man with a plan

Today’s American Football game at Croke Park is merely a stepping stone to bigger things

Put the chest-puffing and faux-outrage about today’s All-Ireland semi-final to one side for a minute, and there’s a success story hiding in plain sight.

The way Peter McKenna, Croke Park stadium director and GAA commercial director, puts it, there’s more benefit to the UCF-Penn State game than simply clicking the turnstiles in Jones’ Road.

“A couple of things people should remember about the American football game today,” says McKenna.

“In the middle of it we’ll be showcasing the Super Elevens hurling that we put on last year in Notre Dame: we’ll be showing millions of Americans our national sport, showing this is what we’re about.

“That’s a great opportunity to show the games — normally in America you’re talking about a full house in Gaelic Park for Galway or Mayo, but here you’re actively showing the games to millions of people who are, by definition, sports fans to begin with. That’s part of our commitment to spreading the games overseas, which ties in with Sky and GAAGO, which is a very significant development for us.

“We have significant GAA signage for the game today around the field pushing GAAGO to viewers in America.”

McKenna sees today’s game as a beginning, not an end in itself.

“That’s got to be stressed — what needs to be underlined is the context, the long-term aspect of what we’re beginning this year.

“The deals are short-term but the strategy is long-term. Whatever happens in three years’ time or six years’ time, this is about where we see ourselves in 10 years’ time. We have to have that vision.

“We also have commitments to the diaspora: the Department of Foreign Affairs recently issued a really interesting report stressing the centrality of the overseas GAA club as a totem to Irish people in foreign countries.

“In previous decades you had Irish people engaged in manual labour overseas, but nowadays highly educated Irish people are going abroad, they’re working in boardrooms, and when it comes to expressions of their cultural identity something like GAAGO is invaluable. Our aim is to establish our stars on a par with boxers and Formula One drivers, and this is a first step.

“People might see this as a one-off, a ‘widow’ event, but it’s not. It’s part of a far wider picture.

“There’s a saying that opportunity doesn’t pause, it passes on, and that’s our take on this.”

McKenna is quick to compliment those who helped to facilitate today’s game: “We’ve had a lot of support from the Naughton family of Glen Dimplex, they’ve given us a lot of their expertise and knowledge in that regard. We didn’t have the same level of buy-in from Tourism Ireland or Failte Ireland, which was disappointing.”

It was also costly: McKenna points out that those promotional agencies could have benefited if they were on board earlier.

“They’ve invested massively in ads now around the game, which is great — it’s just that if they’d been involved at an earlier stage they’d have gotten that at a far better rate.

“I’m not criticising anyone, but if we want to be like Barcelona or Melbourne then we need joined-up thinking. We need to think in a far bigger way and to tie the city together in a far more cohesive way.

“You’re trying to show that Ireland can run world-class sports events. We’ve had the Ryder Cup, the Volvo Ocean Race, the Tall Ships Race, the Giro D’Italia, the Tour de France.

“If all these things are to work well, in order to build these you’ve got to have a bigger vision, a 10 to 12-year vision. It’s worth government taking a risk on that, because they’ll get it back in the revenue generated; if you’re relying on private individuals or sporting organisations to take that risk, they’ll look at other areas in which to invest. We need to be tied together more with these plans.”

The gridiron game is the result of two years’ work, he says, but that’s work which also gave Croke Park valuable experience in negotiating, particularly with American interests. That will help in securing continuity of events, he feels.

“We’ve had boxing in Croke Park and if the right bout came along for the venue, good, but those are opportunistic events that come along every now and again. What you’re looking for is something more cohesive, a programme of events. That requires work, time, effort to make it happen.”

And the criticism?

McKenna concedes it’s been a bruising couple of months when the Garth Brooks controversy is factored in, but adds that they’re taking the lessons on board.

“You’ve got to listen to negative comments and learn from them and take them on board. There’s been some hysterics as well, which hasn’t helped.

“I think it’s needed a more balanced, reflective debate in some quarters: megaphone diplomacy doesn’t accomplish anything.

“There have been good, constructive comments made as well and we’ve learned from the experience.

“People should remember that these activities increase the size of the pizza, and the bigger the pizza, the bigger the 86% of revenue that’s recycled through the GAA as a whole, obviously.”