Club Finals 2021 to Finsih in calander year

[five points]

Is the weather always better in March than in December? You can't say in this country.

You can actually. It's normally way drier if not much warmer, which means also that pitches are in better shape both for training and for the games themselves. As well as that the evenings are a lot longer.

[brokencrossbar1]

Is the weather always better in March than in December? You can't say in this country.

I think the idea is to pull the provincials forward a couple of weeks so it can all be completed by end on November/early December. And it makes sense. If the organisation is going to sort out the mess with fixtures there will have to be changes. It might be unpalatable for some to break the St Patrick's Day link but to me it makes less sense keeping club teams going for 8/10 weeks over Christmas after they've already had a long year.

The thing is Seanie the AI club series does not have a huge impact on the fixtures.  The National League goes on around it, across all levels there are maximum 12 teams involved so that's not going to impact much and the reality is that only Kerry are likely to have 3 teams at Junior, Intermediate and senior all at once.  The fixtures mess comes not from the AI club series but from a county by county differential in terms of how they organise fixtures round the county games.  Less BS county competitions like the McKenna Cup in Ulster and streamline that side of things

[magpie seanie]

Is the weather always better in March than in December? You can't say in this country.

I think the idea is to pull the provincials forward a couple of weeks so it can all be completed by end on November/early December. And it makes sense. If the organisation is going to sort out the mess with fixtures there will have to be changes. It might be unpalatable for some to break the St Patrick's Day link but to me it makes less sense keeping club teams going for 8/10 weeks over Christmas after they've already had a long year.

The thing is Seanie the AI club series does not have a huge impact on the fixtures.  The National League goes on around it, across all levels there are maximum 12 teams involved so that's not going to impact much and the reality is that only Kerry are likely to have 3 teams at Junior, Intermediate and senior all at once.  The fixtures mess comes not from the AI club series but from a county by county differential in terms of how they organise fixtures round the county games.  Less BS county competitions like the McKenna Cup in Ulster and streamline that side of things

I think it's part of an overall approach. I those those subsidiary county competitions should go and perhaps have Sigerson played in that window. Running Sigerson alongside the National League is crazy.

[five points]

I think it's part of an overall approach. I those those subsidiary county competitions should go and perhaps have Sigerson played in that window. Running Sigerson alongside the National League is crazy.

The subsidiary county competitions are merely challenge matches. If you scrap them, teams will play their own challenge matches. The Sigerson and Fitzgibbon should be scrapped unless they can be completed by the end of January.

[Over the Bar]

This will only suit clubs whose county teams are out of the AI Championship early in the year such as Derry and Armagh.

The current way doesn't help Tyrone clubs anyway.....Derry and Armagh clubs with AI senior titles - 9, Tyrone Clubs - 0.

That's 'cos we're having to rush the club championship in Oct while youse lads have been signing on the dole/ diesel smuggling all summer as no football to play.

[brokencrossbar1]

This will only suit clubs whose county teams are out of the AI Championship early in the year such as Derry and Armagh.

The current way doesn't help Tyrone clubs anyway.....Derry and Armagh clubs with AI senior titles - 9, Tyrone Clubs - 0.

That's 'cos we're having to rush the club championship in Oct while youse lads have been signing on the dole/ diesel smuggling all summer as no football to play.

It was funnier when we were signing on the door!!!

[Milltown Row2]

Whether it has a huge impact on county teams is debatable. A max of 3/4 players not involved with their county team will give the squad a chance to get play lads into the panel.

The impact on the club can be big on two fronts, financially it's expensive to run and the likes of Cross must do some fundraising to prepare for this.

But the rewards are massive, the knock effect for future stars within the club, looking to achieve the same as their hero's is great to see. Watching your club step out on Croke is brilliant any day of the week, but on Paddy's Day it's just electric. I'm glad we managed it a few times

[rodney trotter]

The League finals are now wrapped by first week of April, as its a designated Month for Club players. A County team wouldn't have got any use out of Club players involved in All Ireland series, as the League would have been nearly over by time they were back

Not much chance for Club players to enjoy Christmas with semi finals in first week of January . They should have wrapped it up in one calendar year

[brokencrossbar1]

I can tell you as someone who enjoyed 4 AI club campaigns each and every Christmas I had a blast.  If you haven't been involved in the buzz around a parish in the build up to a club final then you cannot really appreciate how much it can lift a place.  I remember AK did an interview where he said the the runs to Ulster and the AI were fantastic for the area, particularly for the older men as it gave them something to discuss and loo forward to in the dark winter months and would have helped them mentally as they had something to look forward to.  The benefits far outweigh any negatives.  I genuinely do not see any negatives as it has very little impact on the running of the county teams.