Would you be in favour of a second tier?

[Hound]

As the capital, Dublin should not be fixed in Leinster. Creates too much of an imbalance in what is already the largest province. Rotate them among all four provinces.

Why should the Dubs get the chance to win every Province? Stupid idea! You are just adding to making Dublin an even more specially treated county. I know the sun shines out of yer arses these days but don't think the rest of us mere mortal are here to accommodate your growing  boredom.

We are special. We are the capital. In 2016, there would have been maybe 8 counties with a realistic chance of winning Leinster if Dublin had not been it. Instead it was just a foregone conclusion from the start. While your post stinks of morbid fear of never winning another Connacht title, it would only be once every 4 years we'd be in Connacht.
Anyway, are you not the one always moaning that you'd love to get the Dubs in Castlebar for a championship match?

[sligoman2]

The GAA don't want to do that. I'm personally not in favour of removing any county from the All Ireland but we do need to do something about our competitions.

Remember, nobody is being removed from the Championship. What I said was if a div 3 or 4 team is beaten in the championship before a certain date, then they would simply go through a backdoor system that only includes other div 3 and 4 teams, with the winners and runners up rejoining the other competition at the quarter final stage.

Change comes slow to the gaa, I remember people up in arms when the back door was introduced. I'm simply proposing that the back door should be based on divisional status - this imo achieves 3 things.
1) more competitive back door games for both tiers
2) easier passage to the later rounds for 2 weaker teams
3) a fair chance to win some silverware in a competition

I assume under your proposal that losing Division 1 and 2 teams would enter another back door system? You're going to run into the issue of odd numbers of teams in each section. Also, a lowly Division 2 team will wonder why they have a harder route through the back door than a competitive Division 3 team.

Yes I am proposing that Div 1 and 2 teams have a seperate back door system and yes it would be tougher for them and so it should be. Div 1 and 2 are the best teams (in theory) and should play the best teams.  Take your point about uneven teams but that's an easy fix with giving teams a bye etc..
I don't see this proposal prolonging the championship, just improving it by having more competitive games.

Why should the bottom team in Division 2 be guaranteed to play a team better than them whilst the top team in Division 3 be guaranteed the opposite?

Your idea isn't bad on the surface so I don't mean to be critical. Just pointing out potential flaws that would be brought up.

Point taken but you have to draw a line somewhere, the bottom team in div 2 would have a better chance of beating a div 1 team than the bottom team in Div 3 or 4

[Hereiam]

The All Ireland series doesn't need a second tier, what needs to happen is that the GAA need to set up a task group to find out what is going wrong in the weaker counties and fix it from the ground up.
I can bet you 9 of 10 counties will have poor youth structures in place which is why they are lagging behind.

[From the Bunker]

As the capital, Dublin should not be fixed in Leinster. Creates too much of an imbalance in what is already the largest province. Rotate them among all four provinces.

Why should the Dubs get the chance to win every Province? Stupid idea! You are just adding to making Dublin an even more specially treated county. I know the sun shines out of yer arses these days but don't think the rest of us mere mortal are here to accommodate your growing  boredom.

We are special. We are the capital. In 2016, there would have been maybe 8 counties with a realistic chance of winning Leinster if Dublin had not been it. Instead it was just a foregone conclusion from the start. While your post stinks of morbid fear of never winning another Connacht title, it would only be once every 4 years we'd be in Connacht.
Anyway, are you not the one always moaning that you'd love to get the Dubs in Castlebar for a championship match?

Yes, if we meet in the Super 8 I'd expect Dublin to be asked to play us in Castlebar. Fat chance of that happening! It would be horsed up to Croker to keep the Corporate Boxes full and the Big wigs happy. Same would happen with your idea of playing in Connacht. The final would end up in Croker!  Do you get the general idea of how it works now!

[Syferus]

The GAA don't want to do that. I'm personally not in favour of removing any county from the All Ireland but we do need to do something about our competitions.

Remember, nobody is being removed from the Championship. What I said was if a div 3 or 4 team is beaten in the championship before a certain date, then they would simply go through a backdoor system that only includes other div 3 and 4 teams, with the winners and runners up rejoining the other competition at the quarter final stage.

Change comes slow to the gaa, I remember people up in arms when the back door was introduced. I'm simply proposing that the back door should be based on divisional status - this imo achieves 3 things.
1) more competitive back door games for both tiers
2) easier passage to the later rounds for 2 weaker teams
3) a fair chance to win some silverware in a competition

I assume under your proposal that losing Division 1 and 2 teams would enter another back door system? You're going to run into the issue of odd numbers of teams in each section. Also, a lowly Division 2 team will wonder why they have a harder route through the back door than a competitive Division 3 team.

Yes I am proposing that Div 1 and 2 teams have a seperate back door system and yes it would be tougher for them and so it should be. Div 1 and 2 are the best teams (in theory) and should play the best teams.  Take your point about uneven teams but that's an easy fix with giving teams a bye etc..
I don't see this proposal prolonging the championship, just improving it by having more competitive games.

Why should the bottom team in Division 2 be guaranteed to play a team better than them whilst the top team in Division 3 be guaranteed the opposite?

Your idea isn't bad on the surface so I don't mean to be critical. Just pointing out potential flaws that would be brought up.

Point taken but you have to draw a line somewhere, the bottom team in div 2 would have a better chance of beating a div 1 team than the bottom team in Div 3 or 4

Don't draw a totally arbitrary line to begin with.

[johnneycool]

The All Ireland series doesn't need a second tier, what needs to happen is that the GAA need to set up a task group to find out what is going wrong in the weaker counties and fix it from the ground up.
I can bet you 9 of 10 counties will have poor youth structures in place which is why they are lagging behind.

Or maybe they just don't have the playing population.

[vallankumous]

Give this another thought? Has it been far away from many GAA fans for the last couple of years?

The question, in my opinion, is too simplistic. Is two tiers enough? Is there much point putting London in the same competition as Armagh?

It's funny to hear Brolly saying that it work if enough respect and attention was given to it. He's the very fella that wouldn't give it two minutes of his time.

I think it would probably fail because most stakeholders would have an apathetic view on it. Maybe with time that would change but at the minute I think (guess) that the majority of GAA people would prefer that their own county remains in the hunt for Sam. The media and the neutral TV viewer are the only groups that would differ, in my opinion.

Keep Sam for the second tier. Sell the naming rights of the top tier.

[twohands!!!]

The attendance at the Leinster final in 2015 and 2016 between Dublin and Westmeath was around the 48,000 mark ; I know the game on Sunday was a semi-final but the attendance was down to 33,370.

Anyone care to guess what the attendance would be like if Dublin play Westmeath next year ?

The average attendance at championship football games has gone from 18,670 in 2001 (the first year of the qualifiers) to 13,146 in 2016.
The total attendance has gone from 1,082,876 in 2001 to 788,746 in 2016. That's a decline of 294,130.
During the same period the population has increased by almost 850,000.

I'd love to know if anyone in the GAA been looking at this decline in detail and seeing what the actual data throws up?

[Rossfan]

The All Ireland series doesn't need a second tier, what needs to happen is that the GAA need to set up a task group to find out what is going wrong in the weaker counties and fix it from the ground up.
I can bet you 9 of 10 counties will have poor youth structures in place which is why they are lagging behind.

Or maybe they just don't have the playing population.

Exactly.
The smallest 11 Counties
Leitrim 0 All Irelands 0 Final appearances
Longford ditto
Fermanagh ditto
Carlow ditto
Ros 2/5/1980
Sligo 0/0
Westmeath 0/0
Offaly 3/6/1982
Laois 0/1/1936?
Monaghan 0/?/?
Cavan 5/ 8 or 9?/1952.
So that's 10 AIs on 120 years - and only Offaly in the last 65 years.

Then there are the 6 hurling Counties - Wexford, Tipperary Kilkenny Waterford Limerick Clare.

[From the Bunker]

Give this another thought? Has it been far away from many GAA fans for the last couple of years?

The question, in my opinion, is too simplistic. Is two tiers enough? Is there much point putting London in the same competition as Armagh?

It's funny to hear Brolly saying that it work if enough respect and attention was given to it. He's the very fella that wouldn't give it two minutes of his time.

I think it would probably fail because most stakeholders would have an apathetic view on it. Maybe with time that would change but at the minute I think (guess) that the majority of GAA people would prefer that their own county remains in the hunt for Sam. The media and the neutral TV viewer are the only groups that would differ, in my opinion.

Keep Sam for the second tier. Sell the naming rights of the top tier.

Absolutely brilliant idea. The top tier competition would end up being called the All Ireland AIG Cup.

[sligoman2]

Interesting to see that based on the polling so far a second tier competition is favored  by almost half the respondents.

Are you listening Croke park

[twohands!!!]

From 2010 to this year (including the games played this year) Division 4 teams have played 155 games in the championship and only beaten non-Division 4 opposition 15 times.

The breakdown of those 15 wins

Division 3 - 10 wins

Division 2 - 4 wins

Division 1 - 1 win

[BennyCake]

Interesting to see that based on the polling so far a second tier competition is favored  by almost half the respondents.

Are you listening Croke park

Nope.

[westbound]

Interesting to see that based on the polling so far a second tier competition is favored  by almost half the respondents.

Are you listening Croke park

Nope.

But more people in this poll voted no to separate championships (or did I misunderstand the question?).

[Rossfan]

The All Ireland series doesn't need a second tier, what needs to happen is that the GAA need to set up a task group to find out what is going wrong in the weaker counties and fix it from the ground up.
I can bet you 9 of 10 counties will have poor youth structures in place which is why they are lagging behind.

Or maybe they just don't have the playing population.

Exactly.
The smallest 11 Counties
Leitrim 0 All Irelands 0 Final appearances
Longford ditto
Fermanagh ditto
Carlow ditto
Ros 2/5/1980
Sligo 0/0
Westmeath 0/0
Offaly 3/6/1982
Laois 0/1/1936?
Monaghan 0/?/?
Cavan 5/ 8 or 9?/1952.
So that's 10 AIs on 120 years - and only Offaly in the last 65 years.

Then there are the 6 hurling Counties - Wexford, Tipperary Kilkenny Waterford Limerick Clare.

Above 17 won 9 Provincial SFCs out of 100 played in the last 25 years.