Home and away: the pinch points and the pitfalls on the road to July

In Gaelic football's (latest) new Championship format, reaching a provincial final significantly helps your All-Ireland prospects. Winning one does not.

NEW FORMAT: Donegal manager Jim McGuinness, left, and Kerry manager Jack O'Connor after the GAA Football All-Ireland Senior Championship final. Pic: Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile

It’s championship football, Jim and Jack, but not as we’ve known it.

Under this format, the sixth we will have had over the past decade, there is an understated, almost casual, disregard for some of the championship’s traditions and conventions which does not yet seem to have dawned on the public, whatever about Messrs McGuinness and O’Connor.