Higgins: Dual GAA/CPA role won’t be conflict

The man embroiled in the conflict between the GAA and the Club Players Association (CPA) says his position should not be a conflict of interests.

Galway man Michael Higgins is a member of the GAA’s fixtures planning committee as well as being part of the CPA executive as their IT coordinator and registrar.

GAA director general Páraic Duffy mentioned him following last Saturday’s Congress when asked about the CPA: “Michael Higgins is a national executive member of the CPA — Michael Higgins is a member appointed by Aogán (Farrell) and I two years ago of the central fixtures analysis committee. What are we supposed to do? It’s (the disconnect) not being driven by us.”

As the CPA executive are set to meet later today to discuss their next step, Higgins said his dual roles should assist in ensuring cooperation between the two bodies.

“I’m a volunteer on both. I’m somebody who is trying to make a contribution and improve things slightly. My philosophy is rather than shouting from the outside you try to get involved and help. We’ll see if a conflict of interest arises but I hope and I don’t anticipate that will happen. I can’t see why a Croke Park fixtures committee would be at odds with an association specifically designed to ‘fix the fixtures’.

“They want the same thing and they might deploy different tactics and strategies to get there but I would hope that my role would complement both committees or associations. If I felt I was compromising either of them, I would step away from one or both.”

Higgins was invited onto the GAA’s fixtures planning committee by Duffy two years ago after he had written to him expressing his frustration with the fixtures situation.

“I’m just a normal fella who has been involved in GAA all my life. I just became disillusioned with the whole thing, really, in terms of fixtures. I outlined my frustrations to Páraic a few years ago and in fairness to him he invited me in for a meeting. I was just a randomer and on the basis of that he invited me onto the fixtures analysis committee.

“Developments had been reasonably slow so when I heard about the CPA I got in touch with Declan (Brennan, secretary). I had never known him before, I got chatting to him and it went from there.

“I think very passionately about the fixtures issue because it’s really crushing the GAA in lots of clubs around the country. While the high-level games are fantastic and everybody should enjoy them, underneath the iceberg there’s a lot of trouble brewing and a lot of that comes back to fixtures.”

The ‘Super 8’ proposal will obviously figure heavily on the agenda of today’s CPA executive meeting.

“It didn’t resolve the issue that we believed to be there and we still feel that. Obviously, it’s been approved and we have to work within those parameters.”