Super 8s

[seafoid]

Na uasal agus íseal ach thuas seal agus thíos seal. Especially in GAA. Mayo might get another year or 2 out of the team they have now.

[sid waddell]

The more I look at this, the more the "outrage" of club players appears to be built around absolutely nothing.

[Jinxy]

Regardless of how I feel about it myself, it's abundantly clear that a significant proportion of the outrage is just noise, i.e. 'People are giving out about something, I'll join in otherwise I'll feel left out."
It doesn't take much effort to tweet about the 'Grab All Association' and how they're a 'DISGRACE!'.

[sid waddell]

Where did this statistic come from? Sounds like nonsense.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/gaelic-games/radical-reform-gets-green-light-in-bloodless-congress-victory-35482934.html

Since the qualifiers were introduced in 2001:

On average it took seven games for a team to win an All-Ireland senior football championship over 21 weeks. The new system would have nine rounds over 18 weeks.

Dublin played their first game on June 4 last year. Their last game was on October 1. That's 18 weeks, and that's with a replay in the final. No team has ever taken 21 weeks to complete their All-Ireland winning programme of fixtures since the qualifiers were introduced, as far as I'm aware.

Tyrone took 20 weeks to win the 2003 All-Ireland (May 18-September 28), and that's the longest time frame I can think of.

Tyrone 2005 and Donegal 2012 took 19 weeks respectively, but most other All-Ireland winning campaigns lasted around 16 weeks.

[seafoid]

September will have to be added to the list of months with nothing interesting happening

[sid waddell]

September will have to be added to the list of months with nothing interesting happening

While I sometimes think the first night of winter is the night University Challenge returns to BBC 2 in the second week of July, I generally think of the night of the All-Ireland football final as the actual first night of winter.

So winter will begin in August, now.

Keith Duggan has a lovely piece in yesterday's Irish Times re. same.

[Jinxy]

It took us 56 weeks to get to the the All-Ireland final in '91.

[sid waddell]

It took us 56 weeks to get to the the All-Ireland final in '91.

That was balanced out by a 1 week campaign in 1992.

[Jinxy]

We needed the break.

[sam03/05]

Surely these proposals will actually be good for club football
Yes there will be a lot of county games in July / August
But that's no different from now. ( with most of the weaker counties knocked out by that stage anyway) 
The fact that the season is over the last week in August
Allows the club season to effectively be played in September / October / November
Surely that is a much better alternative than what's in place now.

Also the Dubs will have to play two championship games away from Croke Park
Which will add a lot of interesting games. The likes of Kerry won't have a cake walk to the
Final every year oi they had to go away to Ballybofey or somewhere.
The only thing that's missing is atwo tiered structure with the second tier  playing final at All Ire final.
Overall I think it's actually a better deal for club players
As the club championships will take place in sept/ Oct/ Dec no matter what

[Syferus]

None of those games are terribly interesting. Dublin could play those teams on an inflatable raft with 14 men and probably still win.

[seafoid]

September will have to be added to the list of months with nothing interesting happening

While I sometimes think the first night of winter is the night University Challenge returns to BBC 2 in the second week of July, I generally think of the night of the All-Ireland football final as the actual first night of winter.

So winter will begin in August, now.

Keith Duggan has a lovely piece in yesterday's Irish Times re. same.

I think the Rose of Tralee will be the official end of summer now
There is such a finality to the end of the football final. It's such a long grey time until TSG cranks up again. 

[Fuzzman]

Sam 03/05, usually the Dubs get a 1/4 final, semifinal and AI final in Croker
Now they get 2 of their group matches in croker and one away so basically an extra game in Croker before the semi and final meaning an extra large payout for the GAA.

It sounds like the GPA are saying the county players don't want all these extra matches in July & August but were never consulted.

[Captain Scarlet]

I read a lot of anger on social media and my own club have been very vocal on twitter condemning these motions. There is a strange disconnect between ordinary members being mostly against (anecdotally) yet delegates and county boards being overwhelmingly for. Leave that aside for now, this is a huge 2 fingers up to the players, both club and county. As a club volunteer and coach I am primarily concerned with the club scene. I can see a strike of sorts on the cards here - in fact I would recommend one!

I would suggest that all players should go to the next monthly meeting of the club and mandate them not to pay their county board fees. If every club in Ireland does that the delegates wont be long listening to them. It seems money rules everything in the GAA and it is sad to see the first president from my own county making such a disgrace of himself overseeing this mess.

Edit - breaking  http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/sport/gpa-will-respond-strongly-to-super-8-snub-says-earley-778890.html

This is a key key thing. If a county man walks into a local club meeting when prior to this being up decision at county board level and really makes his case the club will be swayed to in turn vote against it at county convention, then it would have been defeated.
There is already a mechanism in the GAA that could have stopped the Super 8s. No point Tweeting anger all day and saying the GAA don't listen when there was no effort to engage in the channels that are already there.

[Redhand Santa]

With most things these days or any kind of change I do think the reaction has been over the top. It won't finish club football or lead to professionalism etc. I said before I do think a split in the season for county players is needed and maybe this is a move towards that. Judging by an earlier draft schedule for next year (I'm not sure how official it was) 30 counties will finish up by the end of July. Does that not lead to enough time for county players to be available for the most important club games?

Club football and scheduling has to be looked at and this definitely adds to the urgency needed to look at it. In Tyrone (county I have most knowledge off) there is 15 club league games followed by relegation/promotion play offs and a straight knockout championship. There is 3 divisions of 16 with division one teams entering senior championship, division 2 intermediate and division 3 junior. County players are available for 10 of the league games plus the play offs and championships. What usually happens is the first 7 or so games with the county players get played by late June/early July and the 5 starred games are used quick enough. This then leads to weeks of inactivity waiting for Tyrone to finish up. Then its a struggle to get the remaining 3 league games played plus the championship and league play off games.

The new system could make it even harder as there will be less room in the calendar in April/May/June for league games. So county boards should be thinking about what would work best.

If it was up to me I'd change the structures in Tyrone. I'd have a league that runs from April to end of July which doesn't determine the championship you play in and the dates are set in stone and played whether county players are free or not. I'd do the leagues on a regional basis split by senior/intermediate so the games are local games with less travelling and play them on a Friday night to suit the club players. A lot of derbies and great prep for the championship with it being run off before it.

Then from start of August have the championship which would have a league element. There's 16 teams at senior level so split them into 2 groups of 8 (some kind of seeding to avoid all strong teams in one group - maybe based on earlier regional leagues). 7 games with county players available for them all. Played until 3rd week in September. Top 4 teams make the quarter finals to be played off in October. Bottom teams relegated to next division and second from bottom involved in a play off (same week quarter finals played).

County players would be available for all games that determine your championship status and its less games to fit in with them than the current requirement. There'd be regular football for club players from April to July with lots of local derbies acting as great prep for the championship and a good stand alone comp. And the benefit of Friday night games to avoid taking up the weekends.

The one big potential flaw in my system is if Tyrone got to the All Ireland final in 3rd week of August. But surely for most counties thinking outside the box a little could lead to a far better structure and less reliance on county fixtures to determine games. And most counties wont get to the All Ireland final so will have a minimum of 3 months to get games played with county players.