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I'd say you're not far wrong Enda. Except Mayo under McStay were pretty brainless and weren't saving much powder at all, foot to the floor the old Mayo way and sure let's see what happens. Roscommon did a tactical job on them in the Connacht championship. Mayo didn't save much for the final few furlongs and just ran out of road.

But yes, more teams will disregard the provincials next year I feel, even though winning one is a big big advantage in the groups. But look at who's in the AI final. The sporting imbalance between the provinces is still in place despite the new system. Dublin and Kerry can build nicely through the spring and the early rounds of championship (with all the safety nets in place) while Ulster and Connacht teams of top 12 standard flog themselves to survive at the league top table and undergo the rigours of early round championship football against direct rivals. Dublin and Kerry don't really have that to negotiate so the provincial system is still stifling the bigger picture.

If I was Meath in '24 I'd certainly be going down the route of - win league/promotion OBJECTIVE NO..1 , Give Leinster a proper good lash but always remember we are peaking for AI group stages and can/will regroup if Leinster goes badly.

It's a f**king hames of a system in fairness 😄

They are training flat out from October to end of summer and living in gyms. It's bullsht. Lads want games not training. 14 league games plus  max 5 if you get to AI final is hardly punishment over the course of a season.

Intercounty players only go back to their clubs for county championship by and large. That should be straight knockout too by the way. With an extended league campaign for the so called ordinary club player while their county panel colleague is away on the national stage.

On the Saints thing, I've often felt in Roscommon we have an inordinate amount of St. X clubs. I think 10 or so out of total 32. Would that be a common enough ratio in other counties?

St. Faithleachs is a great one. They won Connacht inter last year or year before so was gas listening to national radio trying to pronounce it when covering their games !

McGeeney made an interesting suggestion a few weeks ago ref. the league being a great competition, said he'd love to see it in a home and away format with 14 games.  That would be some league in fairness, though the calendar couldn't accommodate it as it currently stands.

I would play league from beginning of season to end of season like in soccer. Something like 14 games home and away or maybe a three division  league of 11 teams playing each other once. Put the championship on in between on designated weekends like the FA Cup. Straight knockout championship. End of the season is AI final a couple of weeks after leagues end.

The league is good but could be better. Too many teams with different agendas. Eg Kerry not near ready for start of league. End of league sees teams start to turn eye to championship if their league position allows.

Play it the whole season alongside championship so teams can't be going at different paces depending on their province/championship plan. It should be a great competition not tainted  by shadow boxing. And keep the fckn championship do or die, white heat, all on the line. Less of this complicated nonsense where they are trying to crowbar more games in that often are not 'championship ' in flavour at all.

Ros are 10/3 favs to win division 1
https://www.oddschecker.com/gaelic-games/gaelic-football

You might think with Championship the following week Roscommon wouldn't go full tilt if they got to the league final, but really they should - it would be their first senior national title since 1979 (or second since 1944), so they should treat it like an All-Ireland final and put it higher priority than Championship where realistically they've no chance of winning Sam.

I agree. From the position we are in now I would be going all out for the league. All out 1000%. No Dublin, Kerry still warming up, Ulster teams in various stages of transition. Mayo are flying but won't really want a league,  it's Sam or nothing for them.

We can nab a Connacht every now and then by beating perhaps one serious team, the league (div 1) is a different kettle of fish. I don't expect us to get close to winning it but it would be my preferred target for the year from where we sit now.

The championship with its new set up is an unknown.

Ros are 10/3 favs to win division 1
https://www.oddschecker.com/gaelic-games/gaelic-football

I think it's very long odds Ros win the league. More likely we lose narrowly up in Fortress Clones this Sunday, then we have Mayo followed by Kerry, who would back Ros vs those two? Then last game home vs Donegal who might need a win to stay up. We could lose the next 4 very very handy. The league is so even and unpredictable that's what makes it a great competition. I wish it had more prominence in the calendar.

Never mind referees , players or bad decisions that pitch in Dr Hyde Park is terrible. Players slipping everywhere. Someone could get badly injured.

A friend of mine played County hurling on it. Said it was one of the best pitches he was ever on. The old surface before it was relayed was old school. A bumpy field.

Ros were certainly guilty of buying frees and feigning injury. Its not great to see but most teams utilise the dark arts these days. Ros were a soft naive team before this year. We are sick of the narrative of great forwards but conceding monster scores once anyone has a right go at us. So, personally I will accept a bit of cynical stuff as that is part of the streetwise game management that top teams often have. We appear miles ahead of where we were in that regard and not such a soft touch tactically anymore.

[but hopefully the loss margin in the second game will be much lower than if the team played a Div 1 or Div 2 team.]

Good effort Seanie, but your points are fairly easily challenged I feel. It gives I'd say less than half the teams a chance of a national championship. Half of those affected voted against it.

Thinking that it will evolve into extra games is hardly relevant. It certainly won't evolve in the next three years so half of those teams will still get only two games.

There were any amount of alternatives that had more merit than what we've ended up with. And that's before we get into the rush to get it through, the two player unions being against it and the fixture review committee being in the middle of their work.

You are correct that half the teams will only get two games but hopefully the loss margin in the second game will be much lower than if the team played a Div 1 or Div 2 team.  We all know Sligo had a few upsets in the backdoor over the years but it was always a question of time before we were knocked out. In this competition, we may have a chance to get to a final or semi-final or perhaps win and thats not happening under the current format.  It becomes a question of if we will lose not when we will lose and that can a very good thing for smaller counties.

As I said before, time will tell but I for one am hopeful that this gets legs and get the support it deserves from HQ and the media....

I doubt that is what players will think, togging out for an irrelevant competition.

I assume you are from a big senior club in your county?

Do you look at your junior and intermediate competitions as irrelevant? I assure you there are not to those that win them  if that is their usual level.

In fairness I think throughout the history of the GAA rural clubs have come, gone or amalgamated depending on local, national and international economic realities. Rural depopulation is far from being the GAAs fault and it's not really the governments either. That whole picture is far bigger.

Not from the club but was looking at Kilmore (RN) history recently. For outsiders (and no offence to any kilmore people who might be reading) this is a place in the back arse of beyond, sandwiched up in north Roscommon in a corner against the Shannon and with no through traffic on the road to no where. Agricultural land is marginal at best and when I played on the pitch as a young lad it was growing reeds and rushes as much as grass.

But in the early days of the association a few different entities operated as clubs in the current Kilmore area. They came and went and Kilmore itself almost went in the post war period only resurfacing as an adult team in the 70s. It's a very proud club to this day but is fielding amalgamated teams at underage in recent years as population problems hit again for a second time in their history. Maybe in years to come Carrick will explode and Kilmore will benefit from an overspill and the numbers will swell again. Or maybe the club will dissolve or merge with the likes of Shannon Gaels, or Kilmore lads will end up playing with Strokestown or Elphin depending on which end of the place they come from.

Point being it's happened before and will happen again. It's not anybody's fault as such, certainly not the GAAs , the wheels of history turn and rural clubs like this will come and go.

There's bound to be plenty up and down the country where a town is split by a river or whatever and is in two counties. Ballyleague/Lanesboro is essentially the same town split by the Shannon but it's called Ballyleague in Roscommon and Lanesboro in Longford, the two sides don't really mix and the rivalry is there alright, both sides considering the other weird. St Faithleachs the Gaelic club on the Ros side would have a definite superiority complex over their neighbours Rathcline over the bridge and the Larrys wouldn't be too fond of that.

On Athlone , there's actually a reasonable distance between the likes of Athlone GAA, Garrycastle, Clann and Brigids. Obviously the two town teams are closer like any urban sides would be but the two Ros teams have their own definite area and are both a nice ten minute spin out of town.

The 2 sides promoted from D3 will be considered D2 then and will be Tier 1.

That's not what it says in the rte article

Under the new proposals, Division 3 finalists Westmeath and Laois would have played in a Tier 2 championship rather than the All-Ireland qualifiers this summer

When it was 1st before CC it was said that promoted teams from D3 would be classed as D2 /Tiet 1.
Either that's been changed or RTE have got it wrong.
Sure it wont be happening anyway as Hardstation and Bennycake will stop it.

It will happen. Amazingly, in such a democratic association, the top brass always seem to get what they want. He who pays the piper calls the tune.
My county and many others can forget about county football when it does happen. There will be zero progression and eventually zero interest. Club football will win though.

I'll content myself with the Tommy Murphy Final DVD from yesteryear.

What 'progression' are you enjoying at the moment? Is just by virtue of theoretically being in the hunt for Sam bringing on loads of young fellas in Antrim? Any weaker county (I include my own as one of these) should target their provincial championship first and foremost. Its attainable.

If not achieved why would players not want to continue to play championship at their own level in a sort of 'intermediate' competition?

I've really enjoyed the league again this year, three rounds in, plenty of stories and intrigue. The super 8s were introduced to try and improve the structural mess of the championship and there is constant talk of tiered championships. Maybe the powers that be were over complicating things. The perfect tiered competition is staring them in the face and more and more people are open about the league being the best competition we have. How about we just improve what we have???

Give the league more prominence.
Cut out the flab out of the championshiip.

I would run the league and championship concurrently. Three league divisions of 10,10,12 played from March to June. Championship starting in April and an open draw straight knockout played in between league games much like the soccer in England does the FA Cup. League semis and finals in July. AI final August bank holiday weekend.

Provincial championships played in Jan/Feb as stand alone competitions directly replacing FBD, McGrath cup etc.

Crucially, club leagues run in tandem with the county season from March to July. WITHOUT county panelists unless deliberately released by county management. Club championship played with full panel when county season over in August, Sept and October.

I know this is a bit off topic but I've just been thinking of ways to improve the league as you still get the very top teams (Kerry, Dublin ) giving it the "arra it's only the league we won't be getting excited" and "we're only back 4 weeks ie we don't give a shit" when for everyone else it's the best competition they have yet isn't given the full respect it deserves.

I think that tonight was a good advert for the 3 hand pass rule. A tight low scoring game but still fairly entertaining to watch. Teams can still set up with a strong emphasis on defence, like WH did, recycle the ball across the back and middle, but they must have a few outlets up top.  The best thing I reckon is that due to the nature of creating an emphasis on foot passing the ball is regularly played forward in riskier scenarios than it has been in recent times, there are more duels and turnovers and it creates a more exciting and skilful spectacle than lads endlessly turning back and throwing a safe hand pass rather than risk a ball off the foot and a bollocking from his manager.

In one fell swoop unending periods of recycled possession and cautious probing have been eradicated. Give it a chance lads!

Yes, the handpass rule is there to make the blanket less attractive. When a ball is turnedover near your own goal and you only have three fist passes to get out of danger you damn well better have men up the field or out wide to kick it to. The only teams who would continue to play blankets are minnows looking to avoid tankings. The rest of the games would open up as the skills of accurate kicking, catching, getting out in front, winning duels etc would come to the fore. As is natural the best and most gifted players would thrive, the best teams usually would win. Not the best coaching systems and fittest players who are just carriers of the ball as is now the case. It would see a move away from possession based football towards one with more "turnovers" or contested possessions as the ball will have to be released more frequently. A bit like the way it is in hurling, where the battles one on one and play shifting this way and that make it an exciting spectacle for the crowd and exciting to participate it in for the player. Those teams persisting under the new hand pass rule with mass defence would soon be found out as teams realise that when a forward ball is lost or turned over you press and harry the hell out of the defence as there are only 3 fist passes until they have to kick it and with hardly any forwards up the mass defence team is going to be camped in for quite a while!

One positive change I'd like to see is a traditional Irish split in the GAA. Let the Ulster teams who favour the current set up carry on as they are, giving primacy to tactical massed defence, running with the ball through "blankets", passing through the hands, further development of the game into a sort of basketball/rugby hybrid, coming up with new ways to spoil the spectacle etc etc and let the more naive, purist counties from Connacht , Munster and Leinster get on with developing their game back into something it should resemble i.e. FOOTball 😜