Promoted creatively, the AIL could be very successful

VERY often among GAA people, when the thorny subject of payment for players is introduced, the nay-sayers point to rugby as an example of how things went badly wrong within local clubs when that sport went professional.

I wonder though, how right are they? The introduction in 1990 of the All-Ireland League was one of the best things that ever happened to Irish rugby. Prior to that the rugby club scene was confined and excited major support only on provincial cup days, days that were few and far between for most.

For league games, and again whether at junior or senior level, support was marginal, confined in most cases to a dedicated few.

With the AIL, however, came massive interest and massive support, and club rugby was rejuvenated. The general media assumption was, of course, that the big Dublin clubs would dominate, with real competition from Ulster. The provincial boys from Limerick and Cork? Well, they’d compete, they’d fight, they’d be tough, they’d be physical, they’d put it up to the Dublin/Ulster axis but sure God help them, they simply didn’t have the class, did they?

The reality was very different.

Cork Con won the first championship, Limerick went on to become the dominant city, Shannon the dominant club (eight titles to date, including a four-in-a-row), as club rugby became a real force.

Then came professionalism and the clubs, the AIL, went into decline – or so goes the popular argument. But is it that simple? I don’t think so.

What really hurt the AIL, hit the attendance figures, was the rise of the Heineken Cup and the success of Munster especially. What people tend to overlook is this; outside of the international games, interest in rugby was never very high in Ireland. It was confined to just a few select areas. The AIL sparked a broader interest, which grew again with the Heineken Cup, and has continued to grow since then, to the point where I would say that interest in rugby in this country is now at unprecedented levels.

The problem from the point of the clubs, however, is that this interested fan base has either left them in recent years to follow the provinces, or by-passed them entirely. I don’t see this as having been caused by the introduction of professionalism, I see it as just a natural progression.

Where the introduction of professionalism did hurt a lot of clubs, however, was in the amount of club cash that was handed over to their own professional players, cash which, in a lot of cases, those clubs could ill afford. Bad management, that was all, bad book-keeping, and it’s up to individual clubs to sort that our for themselves.

THE RUGBY fans who have forsaken the AIL for the Munster and Ireland fast-rolling bandwagon don’t know what they’re missing. I’ve been going to these games from the outset – as a fan for the first few years, before I got into this business – and I’m telling ye this, the rugby is better.

The players are bigger, stronger, fitter, faster, more skilled in most facets of the game (scrummaging is still scrummaging); game-plans are more adventurous, more sweeping and more inclusive.

In short, it’s a better spectacle. Clubs are just as committed, ancient rivalries just as ferocious, new rivalries built and maintained.

Certainly there have been casualties, big clubs losing ground along the way, but what of the flip side? What of the rise of clubs like Clonakilty and Barnhall, currently vying for promotion to the top division, of Thomond and Midleton in Division 2, of Ballynahinch, Nenagh Ormond, Bruff and Connemara Blacks, all now campaigning at senior level by right, having fought their way to that status, a meritocracy rather than the old snooty aristocracy.

At the moment there is a huge battle going on at the top of division 1 of the AIL, five clubs within six points of current top four (only one of which isn’t from Munster, but then who mentions Clontarf when they talk of the problems of club rugby in Dublin? A northside club showing the southsiders how it’s done – oh, the shame!). It’s a terrific battle, gone on all season long, yet very few people seem to be aware of it. Whose fault is that? For the past few weeks we’ve started to see ads appearing in the national newspapers, unusual ads. Their focus? The National Leagues; their source? Why, the GAA itself. The GAA has finally cottoned on to the fact that they can no longer rely exclusively on others to do their games promotion for them; they have become pro-active. The National Leagues have always been a good product; not the top product – that’s the championship – but next best thing, as managers try to get their panels sorted out for bigger tests ahead.

The AIL isn’t the rugby at the top, but it’s still a very good product. The GAA has set a lot of sporting standards in this country, standards the other major sporting organisations have never come near, in a lot of instances. This is one the IRFU would do well to take on board.

Take ownership of this AIL; in tandem with its major sponsors, AIB, give it the promotion it needs, the promotion it deserves. You’d never know what might happen.

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