Collingwood to play Dublin!!!!!

[Gnevin]

I am aware of that, but ultimately AFL are actively scouting our players for their gaelic skills. Dont think there are many Rugby scouts looking for potential players at GAA matches, likewise for soccer.

Anyway what can we do to keep our players here??

So one  code scouts the player when they are younger whats the difference?

[Hardy]

Gnevin, rugby and soccer are not within an ass's roar of being the threat to football that this AFL recruitment drive is. Can anyone remember a really top player since Kevin Moran who has been lost to soccer or rugby? The point is that the AFL are looking for the very best young talent we have. The lads who go to soccer and rugby, for the most part were never going to be the very best footballers anyway.

Look at the players the Aussies have taken already - the very top young players in the country.  More worryingly, look at the exponential rate of drain, from one or two every few years a short time ago to at least half a dozen last year alone, to the latest, not-hugely-surprising step of setting up an organised poaching operation here. This has the potential to turn the GAA into a feeder operation for professional football in Australia. Think League of Ireland/Premiership or AIL/Pro Rugby.

I've been banging the drum about this for a while now, but the typical response I get is "how dare the GAA try to interfere with a young lad's dream of professional sport - let them go". Well I think that would be a nonsensical attitude for the GAA to take. Of course youngsters are entitled to pursue their dreams, but that's not the argument. Likewise, of course there's nothing the GAA can or should do by way of preventing amateurs from doing what they wish. But the GAA's role is to promote and protect Gaelic Games. It has no function in grooming youngsters for professional sporting careers, so "ah sure isn't it great for the young lad" isn't a reasonable policy.

Having said that, I have no great ideas as to what we can do about it. We can't impose effective barriers against the Aussies - they have no reason to take any notice. I can see no reason why they would want to co-operate in a "please don't poach" policy either. I can't see them being willing to compensate clubs, unless it was to formalise the while thing by funding development of youngsters. That would turn the GAA effectively into their development academy. Goodbye GAA if that were to happen.

Of course professionalising the GAA at the top level is an obvious answer, but I'd rather fry in the pan than jump into that fire. I can only suggest some sort of extension of current  scholarship schemes and to provide sponsored apprenticeships for non academically inclined youngsters. Bud Wiser posted an idea along these lines here before.

One way or another, we have to find ways to make staying in the GAA a more attractive option than going to Australia. Sitting on our hands is not an option, unless we want to see all our best players playing in Australia in a few years and the All-Ireland series being contested by the second string lads who weren't good enough for pro football in Australia.

[Jinxy]

In a lot of cases you will only lose a lad for 2 years. Not everyone will make it. So you lose a lad basically for the period he will be eligible for u-21 football. If they took a couple of lads from every county and every one of them was a huge success there would be no Australian players left in the AFL. Leave them at it. The sky isn't falling, although I do appreciate it may be more of a problem for the smaller counties. There may be an upside though. I can see the promotion of hurling leaping to the top of the agenda in county board meetings nationwide. 

[zoyler]

Have to agree Jinxy - I think its just some guy in Oz trying to reinvent the wheel with regards to spotting young talent and making a profit by selling it to some gullible clubs.

[Gnevin]

Gnevin, rugby and soccer are not within an ass's roar of being the threat to football that this AFL recruitment drive is. Can anyone remember a really top player since Kevin Moran who has been lost to soccer or rugby? The point is that the AFL are looking for the very best young talent we have. The lads who go to soccer and rugby, for the most part were never going to be the very best footballers anyway.

Look at the players the Aussies have taken already - the very top young players in the country.  More worryingly, look at the exponential rate of drain, from one or two every few years a short time ago to at least half a dozen last year alone, to the latest, not-hugely-surprising step of setting up an organised poaching operation here. This has the potential to turn the GAA into a feeder operation for professional football in Australia. Think League of Ireland/Premiership or AIL/Pro Rugby.

I've been banging the drum about this for a while now, but the typical response I get is "how dare the GAA try to interfere with a young lad's dream of professional sport - let them go". Well I think that would be a nonsensical attitude for the GAA to take. Of course youngsters are entitled to pursue their dreams, but that's not the argument. Likewise, of course there's nothing the GAA can or should do by way of preventing amateurs from doing what they wish. But the GAA's role is to promote and protect Gaelic Games. It has no function in grooming youngsters for professional sporting careers, so "ah sure isn't it great for the young lad" isn't a reasonable policy.

Having said that, I have no great ideas as to what we can do about it. We can't impose effective barriers against the Aussies - they have no reason to take any notice. I can see no reason why they would want to co-operate in a "please don't poach" policy either. I can't see them being willing to compensate clubs, unless it was to formalise the while thing by funding development of youngsters. That would turn the GAA effectively into their development academy. Goodbye GAA if that were to happen.

Of course professionalising the GAA at the top level is an obvious answer, but I'd rather fry in the pan than jump into that fire. I can only suggest some sort of extension of current  scholarship schemes and to provide sponsored apprenticeships for non academically inclined youngsters. Bud Wiser posted an idea along these lines here before.

One way or another, we have to find ways to make staying in the GAA a more attractive option than going to Australia. Sitting on our hands is not an option, unless we want to see all our best players playing in Australia in a few years and the All-Ireland series being contested by the second string lads who weren't good enough for pro football in Australia.

No top level but we loose dozens top quality minors and below to these codes every month . The 3/4 who may go to Aus every year is nothing to the numbering playing "garrison sports"

[Rossfan]

[quote author=Hardy link=topic=6667.msg244938#msg244938 date.



I can only suggest some sort of extension of current  scholarship schemes and to provide sponsored apprenticeships for non academically inclined youngsters.

[/quote]

The "one belief" crowd will have a fit if this ever comes to pass.

[Hardy]

I don't think there's any equivalence between sports scholarships/sponsored education, a totally laudable way of promoting the games and pay-for-play money-grabbing by people out to cream whatever they can get for themselves on the back of the voluntary efforts of others.

[thejuice]

PROPOSED NEW RULES FOR THE INTERNATIONAL RULES GAMES

GAA players won't have to serve carry-over suspensions, picked up in future International series, to championship matches, but will count against NFL games

AFL players will feel the full force of a new disciplinary system in their parent code with parallel sanctions commensurate with infractions committed in the AFL showpiece, the Grand Final. Because it is the showcase game, misconduct in the Grand Final is treated more seriously than any other game and International Rules misconduct will fall into line with that standard.

video match referee is to be appointed from another country with a background in sports officiating

the type of tackle that felled Graham Geraghty into a state of concussion during the controversial second test in 2006 has been outlawed. Slinging, slamming or driving an opponent into the ground when executing a tackle will now merit a straight red card. The use of one-handed tackles has also been removed.

Aspects of the playing rules have changed. No team will be permitted more than four consecutive hand passes. After the fourth pass the onus will then be on the player in possession to kick the ball.

And a referee who stops play in the half of the field where he is officiating cannot be overruled by the other referee, something that has proved controversial and divisive in the past.

A series of recommendations have also been made that include the Irish and Australian teams taking the field in the company of children and lining up to exchange handshakes before the start.

[Hardy]

What's the bloody point. Now they'll just send a band of even worse savages who they don't mind getting suspended as the serious players' clubs won't be allowing their players to take part and risk suspensions.

My central objection to this game just dawned on me at the moment of Geraghty's injury in the last IR game. It's dangerous and irresponsible, in a game involving a physical tackle, to allow competition between professionals who have been trained in how to take the tackle and amateurs who haven't. Two weeks of practice once a year, at best, isn't good enough. Your natural inclination prevails in the heat of the game and, at least some of the time,  a GAA player taking the ball past an opponent or contesting a ball doesn't expect and therefore doesn't brace himself for a full-blooded physical tackle on himself instead of an incidental collision in contesting the ball. Taking a blow unbraced is very dangerous. It killed Harry Houdini, for instance. More to the point in this case, it can easily result in a broken neck or serious head injury.

This has nothing to do with nonsense about "standing up to them", etc. We've shown before, especially in the 80s, that we can pick men who will make the Aussies step back in a square-up. Admittedly there are fewer of them in our newly sanitised game, but if the object was to pick the hardest men, we could field fifteen fighters who could skelp all around them. That's not the point.

I'm firmly convinced this game is dangerous for the reason mentioned and I fear someone will be very badly injured. I thought for a while that moment had come when Graham Geraghty was lying motionless in October 2006.

[his holiness nb]

Went to the game Hardy and was convinced he had broke his neck.

Agree fully, scrap the entire thing. No need for it.

Also gives the anti GAA brigade an excuse to slag off gaelic games for being a savage sport, when our games arent even being played!

[magickingdom]

i'm absolutely thrilled and hope its a great success. as usual the no sayers havent given one once of thought as to what the players want. if ye dont want to watch flick the channel..

[Hardy]

as usual the no sayers havent given one once of thought as to what the players want.

Is "what the players want" now to be the main determinant of GAA policy in all cases? For my part, I only feel qualified to offer MY opinion about the IR game. I'm sure the players are equally capable of articulating their own opinions (or, as you seem to suggest, their combined single opinion) and won't be too worried that I didn't feel the need to state theirs as well.

if ye dont want to watch flick the channel

Right. So no more discussion here about GAA matters, on this GAA discussion board. If we disagree with a match fixture schedule or a team selection or the tactics of our county manager, just don't watch. Flick the channel.

[Mike Sheehy]

Jaysus Hardy, you've gone fierce conservative these days     

[Hardy]

Y'ain't seen nothin yet!


(BTW - is that Willie O'Dea's grandad on the Duce's left - right as we look?)

[western exile]

What's the bloody point. Now they'll just send a band of even worse savages who they don't mind getting suspended as the serious players' clubs won't be allowing their players to take part and risk suspensions.

My central objection to this game just dawned on me at the moment of Geraghty's injury in the last IR game. It's dangerous and irresponsible, in a game involving a physical tackle, to allow competition between professionals who have been trained in how to take the tackle and amateurs who haven't. Two weeks of practice once a year, at best, isn't good enough. Your natural inclination prevails in the heat of the game and, at least some of the time,  a GAA player taking the ball past an opponent or contesting a ball doesn't expect and therefore doesn't brace himself for a full-blooded physical tackle on himself instead of an incidental collision in contesting the ball. Taking a blow unbraced is very dangerous. It killed Harry Houdini, for instance. More to the point in this case, it can easily result in a broken neck or serious head injury.

This has nothing to do with nonsense about "standing up to them", etc. We've shown before, especially in the 80s, that we can pick men who will make the Aussies step back in a square-up. Admittedly there are fewer of them in our newly sanitised game, but if the object was to pick the hardest men, we could field fifteen fighters who could skelp all around them. That's not the point.

I'm firmly convinced this game is dangerous for the reason mentioned and I fear someone will be very badly injured. I thought for a while that moment had come when Graham Geraghty was lying motionless in October 2006.

I have been as angry as most about the standard of football on display during the last series. As you have pointed out yourself in subsequent posts, every one is entitled to their own opinion on the International Rules and other GAA issues.  However, your tirade seems to be based on some misinformation.
The AFL footballers are not dirty savages who are out to do damage to their opponents each and every week. They would not dare execute any of the indiscretions they committed in IR in their own game. The reason being that they would get the sort of sanctions that are now being proposed for future IR games.  The consequences of being suspended, amongst others, are that they lose some of their salary, and that they are not eligible for the AFL equivalent of All Star award that year.  In fact, the general footy public back in Australia was appalled at what their players were doing on the IR field in the name of football.  It just would not happen within the AFL competition.   And the only reason they behaved like they did in the IR, was because they could. There was no punishment for them if they did what they liked. No incentive to play fair.  Hence these  new rule proposals will bring them in line with the behaviour that is expected of them in their home game. And thus make the game safe and fair. 
You call our modern game sanitised, and I know what you mean,  but their modern game is much more sanitised than ours is, in comparison to what they both were in the 80's.
There are many Aussie Hardy's down under, wearing their dinky di hats, calling themselves 'football purists', and moaning about this bastardised game called International Rules. And they are  entitled to their opinion as much as you are here.
However, if your only complaint is about the level of violence in the game, then you should be happy that steps have now been made to rectify this. It is a problem to be solved, and the solution should never be to abandon a the game altogether!  The standard of refereeing in our football code, for example, has is a huge problem these days, and does not seem to be improving much, so should be  abandon the game and concentrate on hurling, camogie, and handball?   

And to say,

serious players' clubs won't be allowing their players

shows a lack of understanding of the structure and organisation of Australian Rules Football.