Welcome to the Professional Gaelic Football League - Open for Discussion

[Maroon Heaven]

Here it is folks - The only way Professional GAA will take off in this country. Forget about the GPA - Its time to bring a professional business approach to it. I've done my maths. What do youse think?


Organisation Structure
A Gaelic Football Franchise with 12 franchises spread across Ireland & UK. The 12 separate franchises will be sold for £1 million and profits will be divided evenly between the GFF and the franchise owners


League Structure
12 Teams
1. Dublin Capitals (based in RDS)
2. Drumcondra Massives
3 Cork Rebels
4. Galway Tribes
5. Omagh Gaels
6. Midland Nomadics (Play 2 matches in Navan, Tullamore, Kildare, Portlaoise)
7. The Borders (Based around South Armagh/Dundalk/Newry)
8. Tralee Kingdom
9. London Patriots
10. Glasgow Irish
11. Birmingham Wolfhounds
12. North West Shamrocks (Based around Manchester/Liverpool)

1 Professional League
Home and Away - 22 games. (11 Home, 11 away)
To be played from April to September
One overall winner

Also a Cup Competition

Financials
I've calculated that for these 12 teams to operate they need a collective Financial budget of £71.5 million p/a

All Figures below are based on a yearly turnover

TV rights
Sky/Setanta - £15 million
Associate TV Partner – TV3 / UTV - £5 million

League Sponsor - £5 Million
Associate League sponsors *4 - £4 million
Cup Sponsor - £2 million

Shirt / Club sponsors - £1.2 per team (based on Ice Hockey with numerious Sponsors)

Gate Receipts - £30,250,000 (Calculated at an average of 5k a gate with average £25 a ticket across Corporate / Adult / Children)

Jersey sales / Club Shop - £5,000,000 (based on magic that figure – but if you have 12 franchises selling a jersey at £45 and associate items – I would need 8333 people for every club to spend £50 a year


Image Rights / Player Endorsements - £5,000,000 (The GFL franchise would own the players rights – so if Locusade wanted to endorse its product through a player they would need it to be managed by the GFL franchise)

Associate Money – Any money coming from the Cup competition and associate marketing at Team level may be retained by the franchise.



Overall Figure collected - £71,500,000
Which will give £6 million for the franchise to be operated on


Structure of Players within Franchise
30 players with an average wage bill of £80,000 a year – Total £2.4 million
I'd see a salary cap of £100k. No transfer fees. Maximum 3 year contract. If a player wants out – Let him walk. If a franchise wants to end a contract let them pay the player his full contract.

Management & Organisation wages £500,000

Transportation and management costs - £1m

Relationship with the GAA
None – Maybe a match in October with the professionals playing the Amateurs

If a Players is offered a Professional contract he has the choice of walking away from the Amatuer game and becoming a professional.
Its up to the GAA to decide what they want to do with the Player if he decides to go back to the Amateur code. I don't see a problem with this as the GAA have allowed the Professional footballers of the AFL return without question, while a similar situation arose in the 80's with Rugby league/Union and eventually the RFU allowed its players return to the Union code

Problems
Getting Suitable pitches
Patenting this idea before some edjit takes it off me

[DuffleKing]

Salary cap £100k for 30 players?

[Maroon Heaven]

Yep - No player is allowed get more then £100k in wages

[full back]

7. The Borders (Based around South Armagh/Dundalk/Newry)

There is your first problem, no way are we playing with any of them Down feckers

[Maroon Heaven]

7. The Borders (Based around South Armagh/Dundalk/Newry)

There is your first problem, no way are we playing with any of them Down feckers

I'll move the team to Belfast then

[Aghdavoyle]

we're doen subsevients now - we only play under them!

[thejuice]

Midland Nomadics (Play 2 matches in Navan, Tullamore, Kildare, Portlaoise)

I think they should just be called Meath or Míde, since it covers most of our old Kingdom anyway.

I know its only hypothetical, but I cant imagine both County GAA and the GFL co-existing for long, one would have to die off financially.

[full back]

7. The Borders (Based around South Armagh/Dundalk/Newry)

There is your first problem, no way are we playing with any of them Down feckers

I'll move the team to Belfast then

We want our own team, they can just feck off (we will take Benny off their hands though)

[magpie seanie]

Even Donal Óg and Dessie know this won't work so forget it.

[Farrandeelin]

Seen as Galway Tribes don't have a large support base they'd have to be excluded too...

[boojangles]

What franchise do Cavan/Donegal/Derry/Mayo/Sligo/Ros/Leitrim etc fall into or have you just forgotten them?

[Rossfan]

I presume in this never neverland scenario players can be from anywhere?
As for 4 clubs based in England and Scotland .... now I know you're a winder upper 

[mayogodhelpus@gmail.com]

Seen as Galway Tribes don't have a large support base they'd have to be excluded too...

Mayo would have a far bigger fan base than Galway, do Galway people actually go to watch Galway as it is.

[macdanger2]

interesting enough, but...

1) would fans have the interest? Why go to see this rather than GAA games?
2) pitches would be v hard to get.
3) 4 teams in the UK is way too much. Distribution of other teams is skewed and leaves out the entire northwest & southeast

[omagh_gael]

OMAGH GAEL'S ABU!!!