McGee blasts GAA's hooter climbdown

Eugene McGee has claimed that the timing of matches brings Gaelic games into disrepute and slammed Central Council’s proposal to abandon the clock/hooter system at Congress tomorrow.

The motion requires two-thirds of delegates to pass. Otherwise, the clock/hooter will be used for this year’s championships, unless Central Council delay it once more.

McGee chaired the Football Review Committee whose clock/hooter recommendation was passed in 2013, and says a number of the reservations about the system are “childish”.

Referring to the concerns arising from the pre-Christmas trials, he says: “There were a list of reasons given (against the clock) and some of them were childish. There were schoolboy explanations. Two Congresses passed the clock (2010 and ‘13). Ladies football use the clock and it’s generally recognised, as far as I can see, among the rank and file of GAA people that the clock is a great idea.

“The first reason against the idea was that we couldn’t afford these clocks. There’s been confusion, to use the word mildly, about the whole thing. Some people inside the inner circles of the GAA never wanted a clock — that’s fairly obvious. Congress, in their wisdom, voted for it twice.

“The FRC, we just reinforced the desire, as we saw it through our surveys, to have a clock. A total of 80% wanted a clock (at inter-county level) so we put that in as a proposal, even though it had already been passed by Congress.”

The Irish Examiner reported earlier this week that clocks with hooters are being installed at present into all county venues.

McGee called this a “ludicrous situation”.

“It defies logic what’s going on. If you want to nitpick about any GAA rule, you can. It’s much easier to stop a proposal than to get it passed. If the clock is to get overthrown on Saturday, it will mean there’s been an incredible amount of lobbying done behind the scenes.

“It seems extraordinary when it’s worked well with the women and in rugby. I still can’t understand why this has all happened. The rank and file, by an overwhelming majority, wanted the clock.”

McGee points to “constant controversy” over the timing of games in recent years. Two cases that stand out are the Dublin-Mayo 2013 All-Ireland SFC final and last year’s All-Ireland quarter-final between Dublin and Cork.

“Two minutes is the average (injury-time). There’s a lot of disrepute attached to that. There are constantly people, not just managers, complaining about time. The people watching on television are always surprised with the timing. That’s been ignored. We’re going to keep at that, in other words, if this motion goes through. We’re going to accept the constant debates about timing. It does bring the GAA into disrepute.”

Under the proposed new timing system, it’s been confirmed that a team leading by two points could end a game after the hooter has sounded by kicking the ball over their own bar.

McGee says such a notion is fanciful. “There are too many rules, a lot of them are antiquated in their wording and have been there for 100 years. It’s technically true that a team could do that but you’re into fairyland at that stage. If you adopt that idea, then it’s easy to criticise everything.

“A more positive way would have been to accept the principle that the clock is going to come in and if it takes another year or two to experiment, by all means do it.

“The overriding body in the GAA – Congress – has twice asked for this to be done and now it’s being said it won’t be done. I can’t recall that ever happening before.

“I accept there are complications but surely three or four people could have come together and got this sorted. The clock works in other sports, that’s the point.