Inter-county training ban comes under the spotlight

The inter-county training ban is under question as six of next year’s 10 Liam MacCarthy Cup teams will be permitted to return to collective training before their official start dates.

Cork, Clare and All-Ireland champions Limerick are not allowed commence full training sessions until December 8 but they along with Wexford, who can recommence training on December 1, participate in the Super 11s Fenway Hurling Classic on November 18.

As reports emerge of one Liam MacCarthy Cup team having already returned to collective training, Galway and Kilkenny will also compete in an exhibition game in Sydney on November 11.

The game is the highlight of an Irish festival in the Sydney Showground.

Galway qualify as 2017 All-Ireland winners and Kilkenny earn the trip after winning this year’s Allianz League Division 1 title.

Both the Super 11s and the festival game have been promoted by the GAA and endorsed as such and the teams involved are given special dispensation to compete in Boston and Sydney.

Rule 6.45 of the GAA’s Official Guide Part 1 explains that senior inter-county panels return to collective training and/or games for the following year on a timetable determined by their exit from the current year’s All-Ireland Championship.

As Cork, Clare, Galway and Limerick all finished up in All-Ireland semi-finals or finals, their return date is December 8 and Kilkenny and Wexford’s December 1 as their campaigns concluded in July/All-Ireland quarter-finals.

Punishment for breach of the closed season is loss of a home venue in the Allianz League, a threat which hung over a number of counties for alleged training camps out of the permitted time period earlier this year.

The likes of the footballers of Armagh (Spain), Donegal (Belfast), Mayo (Kildare) and Dublin (France) and Wexford’s hurlers (Portugal) were asked to explain gatherings but no action has yet been taken against them.

The GAA rule states no training camps are allowed outside a 10-day period prior to a county’s first Championship match.

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