Páraic Duffy blasts corporate ‘lie’
Duffy delivered a stirring address to Congress in Cavan in which he claimed anybody who suggested the GAA were seeking anything more than funding for the expansion of the association were “peddling a lie”.
In his annual report last month, the Monaghan native articulated his anger at how the organisation had been portrayed as “Corporate GAA” arising in the reaction to the cancelled Garth Brooks concerts and the Sky Sports agreement last year
But a clearly vexed Duffy went further in the Slieve Russell Hotel. “The small fish that we are, when you look at the recent deal made for Premier League rights, the average per game for the next contract is £11 million. That is roughly equivalent to what we are bringing in, in terms of TV rights. I actually believe we are probably not getting full value for our TV rights and that is something we have to work on.
“If you only read one section of the GAA, please read the section around so-called corporate GAA. Read that section and if anything in that is wrong, let me know. The only reason we ever, ever, want to generate money in this organisation is to put it back in to make us bigger and stronger and anybody who says otherwise is peddling a lie.”
Duffy also insisted a debate should commence on the amount of games the GAA are making available live on TV. He had primed himself for a debate on the Sky Sports deal but it never transpired. However, he did touch on the subject.
“I’d ask one question, after one year of it, is the GAA worse off because we gave some of our games to Sky Sports? We still showed 100 games free to air in 2014. The quality of TV coverage and production was better than it has ever been before. I think that has something to do with the fact Sky Sports covered our games and RTÉ raised their game as a result.
“I think we are debating the wrong issue. The small number of games that Sky have got in the overall picture isn’t all that important. I think the debate around TV needs to move in a different direction.
“We, as I said, in the course of 2015, will again show 100 live games. Maybe we need to ask ourselves, ‘Is that the way we want to go? Do we actually want to show so many games on TV as we do?’
“Our championship attendances now, and we have done well over the past three years, are less than they were 10 years ago, significantly less. You have to ask the question, is the fact we broadcast so many live games each year impact on our attendances. And what about the impact it has on our club games?”
Despite Clare’s disappointment about their motion calling for all broadcasted games being made free-to-air not making the clár, the county didn’t speak on the subject. There was no dissenting voices from the floor about the Sky Sports deal. Lancashire secretary Fergal Kiernan stressed it needed time and had exposed “our games to a much wider audience”.
Europe’s Central Council delegate Tony Bass acknowledged the Sky agreement was controversial but stressed it had led to “an increased awareness of our games”. He went further and proposed the GAA package, produce and sell their coverage of the games.
“More and more sports are arriving onto our TV screens, whether it be international log-chopping on Eurosport, which believe it or not has attracted significant viewership and probably more than our own games at the moment on Sky.
“But it is definitely something we can look at as a model on how to develop games. We cannot develop our games outside of the island of Ireland without having exposure and we can’t get exposure unless we are on platforms people can access.”
