8 Provinces finalists lose out?

[Farrandeelin]

Maybe it's time to close the back door on teams who can't win their provincial games.

[timmykelleher]

But nobody has cleaned a man out of it with an elbow to the head after the ball has gone either.

Timmy you are some langer. there has been no head butts or grabbing fellows by the throat either as the CCCC has not seen anything or maybe has been told not to see anything by The Sunday Game/Christy Cooney, and that is only 2 of the Cork offences to date.

As the song says: "Dry your eyes mate."


I have very little time for Darragh O'Sé's "Yerra, kerry are great" column in the times but even he admits:

"For that reason there isn't a whole pile of sympathy for Kerry out there. Nobody is shedding tears about us. And rightly so. .....
And you can't expect sympathy. Saturday was a day that was going to come. It was all going to catch up on us.

We have to be manly, dust ourselves down, stand up and accept it."

[Hound]

GAA Director General Padraic Duffy has said the GAA will not consider changing the rules.

An article in the Irish Times today. He also pointed out that this was the first time in 10 years that the Munster champion did not make the semi-finals.

If provincial winners are so worried about lack of match practice, then there is absolutely nobody stopping them organising a challenge game against each other. 

[fearglasmor]

Surely if I put forward a motion at my clubs agm and it is passed and subsequently makes it through to congress, is it not for congress to decide on the structure of the championship and not Mr Padraic Duffy.

Secondly Duffy states that the qualifiers have nothing to do with second chances, it was brought in so that every team would get more than one game in the championship. By that logic, only the first round/first game  losers should play in qualifiers.

This Duffy lad had the same pontificating attitude to the hand pass rule earlier on. I dont ever recall Liam Mulvihill making out that he was the controller of all things GAA.

He is right about one thing, the provincial structure makes it impossible to have an equitable championship and tagging the qualifiers on top of this system just makes it worse.

Abandon the qualifiers, play the provincial championships as stand alone competitions, award the eight provincial finalists with top seeding in an open draw for the all ireland and run it off as a straight knockout competition.

[AZOffaly]

Surely if I put forward a motion at my clubs agm and it is passed and subsequently makes it through to congress, is it not for congress to decide on the structure of the championship and not Mr Padraic Duffy.

Secondly Duffy states that the qualifiers have nothing to do with second chances, it was brought in so that every team would get more than one game in the championship. By that logic, only the first round/first game  losers should play in qualifiers.

This Duffy lad had the same pontificating attitude to the hand pass rule earlier on. I dont ever recall Liam Mulvihill making out that he was the controller of all things GAA.

He is right about one thing, the provincial structure makes it impossible to have an equitable championship and tagging the qualifiers on top of this system just makes it worse.

Abandon the qualifiers, play the provincial championships as stand alone competitions, award the eight provincial finalists with top seeding in an open draw for the all ireland and run it off as a straight knockout competition.

I think they just passed a rule that they won't look at any more rule changes for another 5 years. Maybe he counts format as a rule.

[magpie seanie]

A good idea would be to play all provincial football finals on the same weekend (2 Saturday/2 Sunday) with round 4 of the qualifiers 13/14 days later and then quarters the week after. I know the provincial councils (particularly Connacht and Munster) will baulk at the idea of a Saturday provincial final but the current system is a bit of a mess in terms of gaps for provincial winners/finalists.

[Hardy]

Surely if I put forward a motion at my clubs agm and it is passed and subsequently makes it through to congress, is it not for congress to decide on the structure of the championship and not Mr Padraic Duffy.

Secondly Duffy states that the qualifiers have nothing to do with second chances, it was brought in so that every team would get more than one game in the championship. By that logic, only the first round/first game  losers should play in qualifiers.

This Duffy lad had the same pontificating attitude to the hand pass rule earlier on. I dont ever recall Liam Mulvihill making out that he was the controller of all things GAA.

Spot on there Fearglasmor. Duffy reminds me more and more of his famous near-namesake and fellow Monaghan native, the tin-pot general from the thirties. He seems to view himself as the Ayatollah of the GAA with his ex-cathedra pronouncements and edicts. He doesn't even adopt the pretence of respect for the democratic system we're supposed to be operating.

Mind you, he probably doesn't need to, given the ease with which the executive seems to be able to railroad any proposal it wants through Congress. For instance, I don't know anyone who believes more than 20% of ordinary GAA members were in favour of putting the GPA in charge of player welfare (remember they exclude 95% of players from their membership) or of diverting over €1 million annually to the GPA. This without even the hint of a plan for what they were going to do with it or an explanation from the executive of where this money was going to be taken from. We still don't know. Yet Congress voted to do that with our money and it's done and we're still wondering how it happened.

[Hound]

Abandon the qualifiers, play the provincial championships as stand alone competitions, award the eight provincial finalists with top seeding in an open draw for the all ireland and run it off as a straight knockout competition.

That's pretty much exactly what the current system is for chrisakes!!

The provincial championships ARE stand alone competitions.

The provincial finalists do get seeded in the draws in the All Ireland championships (finalists get a bye to R4 and are seeded in that round, winners get a bye all the way to the QF and get seeded in that draw).

The All Ireland championship is straight knockout (as are the separate provincial championships).

[magpie seanie]

Surely if I put forward a motion at my clubs agm and it is passed and subsequently makes it through to congress, is it not for congress to decide on the structure of the championship and not Mr Padraic Duffy.

Secondly Duffy states that the qualifiers have nothing to do with second chances, it was brought in so that every team would get more than one game in the championship. By that logic, only the first round/first game  losers should play in qualifiers.

This Duffy lad had the same pontificating attitude to the hand pass rule earlier on. I dont ever recall Liam Mulvihill making out that he was the controller of all things GAA.

Spot on there Fearglasmor. Duffy reminds me more and more of his famous near-namesake and fellow Monaghan native, the tin-pot general from the thirties. He seems to view himself as the Ayatollah of the GAA with his ex-cathedra pronouncements and edicts. He doesn't even adopt the pretence of respect for the democratic system we're supposed to be operating.

Mind you, he probably doesn't need to, given the ease with which the executive seems to be able to railroad any proposal it wants through Congress. For instance, I don't know anyone who believes more than 20% of ordinary GAA members were in favour of putting the GPA in charge of player welfare (remember they exclude 95% of players from their membership) or of diverting over €1 million annually to the GPA. This without even the hint of a plan for what they were going to do with it or an explanation from the executive of where this money was going to be taken from. We still don't know. Yet Congress voted to do that with our money and it's done and we're still wondering how it happened.

A brilliant post Hardy and one that succintly explains how subverted democracy in the GAA has become. These guys have such disregard for the "grassroots members" (that they so frequently and sickeningly pay lip service to) that they don't even pretend that it matters what those people think. GAA politics is a mutual back scratching society and perish the thought than anyone invade the inner circle.

[fearglasmor]

Abandon the qualifiers, play the provincial championships as stand alone competitions, award the eight provincial finalists with top seeding in an open draw for the all ireland and run it off as a straight knockout competition.

That's pretty much exactly what the current system is for chrisakes!!

The provincial championships ARE stand alone competitions.

The provincial finalists do get seeded in the draws in the All Ireland championships (finalists get a bye to R4 and are seeded in that round, winners get a bye all the way to the QF and get seeded in that draw).

The All Ireland championship is straight knockout (as are the separate provincial championships).

Its actually very different. There is no qualifier. All teams enter the all ireland and so the q/finalists s/finalists finalists will have played the same number of games. The all ireland is run after the provincial championships so fixtures can be planned properly and counties know exactly what is in front of them. What is there now is a mess resulting from putting a sticky plaster solution in place rather than tackling the fundamental cause of the inequity.

[Hound]

Abandon the qualifiers, play the provincial championships as stand alone competitions, award the eight provincial finalists with top seeding in an open draw for the all ireland and run it off as a straight knockout competition.

That's pretty much exactly what the current system is for chrisakes!!

The provincial championships ARE stand alone competitions.

The provincial finalists do get seeded in the draws in the All Ireland championships (finalists get a bye to R4 and are seeded in that round, winners get a bye all the way to the QF and get seeded in that draw).

The All Ireland championship is straight knockout (as are the separate provincial championships).

Its actually very different. There is no qualifier. All teams enter the all ireland and so the q/finalists s/finalists finalists will have played the same number of games. The all ireland is run after the provincial championships so fixtures can be planned properly and counties know exactly what is in front of them. What is there now is a mess resulting from putting a sticky plaster solution in place rather than tackling the fundamental cause of the inequity.

I dunno how you can say that's "very" different!!

The only difference is that teams get no benefit for progessing in their province in your idea. The counties who are after battling all the way through to win their provinical title enter the first round of the All Ireland series instead of the quarter-finals.  I wouldnt mind that, but no benefit for winning your province is an interesting way of balancing what you call an inequity.

[Rossfan]

A good idea would be to play all provincial football finals on the same weekend (2 Saturday/2 Sunday) with round 4 of the qualifiers 13/14 days later and then quarters the week after. I know the provincial councils (particularly Connacht and Munster) will baulk at the idea of a Saturday provincial final but the current system is a bit of a mess in terms of gaps for provincial winners/finalists.

Timing needs to be a bit more balanced alright.
Kildare lay 6 weekends in a row then get a FOUR week break between Quarter and Semi. They've also put entire Club Championships on hold thill County are out of race for Sam.
(I see P Duffy isnt entitled to speak now !!!! - anyway Micky Harte's nonsense of a round between Provincial winners was bet out the Congress  gate 9 to 1 ?)

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

If provincial winners are so worried about lack of match practice, then there is absolutely nobody stopping them organising a challenge game against each other.

Do you really believe that? Pure nonsense, there's no comparison between a 'real' game and a challenge game; you can't build momentum with friendlies.

This may be the first time that none of the Provincial finalists have made it through to the semis, but it's far from a fluke, it's an inevitability as counties become more accustomed to exploiting the Qualifiers. As I said away back I wouldn't be surprised if Gilroy (and Whelan) actually engineered a loss in the Leinster, and their plan came off, albeit with a few more goals conceded than they might have liked (against Meath). There's no coincidence at play here - Dublin's best run for a long time (and it isn't over yet) came via a different route, the Qualifying route.

No matter how it's spun, and by whom, it's nothing short of an indictment of the current set-up that a) no Provincial pairings are in the last four, and b) that the losing finalists are asked to turn around in a ridiculous six days. Do the powers that be really mean to convey that they're incapable of thinking laterally and intelligently enough to accommodate provinces of different sizes without the really amateurish gaps and squeezes in the fixtures? Not to mention the inequity of the Provincial winners having no luxury of a loss like the rest of the teams.

Duffy was out of order, it's not up to him to dictate how things will be. If Dublin and Tyrone can get another motion forward, with the backing of Kerry, Meath and a few others this time, there'll be little he can do stop it.

We're the fecking laughing stock: "you mean to say that not one of the four best pairings in the country (as per the Provincials) can make it through to the semis because they were beaten by teams who had lost earlier than they did?" Yep, that's about the sorry height of it.

[Mike Sheehy]

But nobody has cleaned a man out of it with an elbow to the head after the ball has gone either.

Timmy you are some langer. there has been no head butts or grabbing fellows by the throat either as the CCCC has not seen anything or maybe has been told not to see anything by The Sunday Game/Christy Cooney, and that is only 2 of the Cork offences to date.

As the song says: "Dry your eyes mate."


I have very little time for Darragh O'Sé's "Yerra, kerry are great" column in the times but even he admits:

"For that reason there isn't a whole pile of sympathy for Kerry out there. Nobody is shedding tears about us. And rightly so. .....
And you can't expect sympathy. Saturday was a day that was going to come. It was all going to catch up on us.

We have to be manly, dust ourselves down, stand up and accept it."

The langers  wouldn't know much about that .
Well, we'll see what ye are made of now. Clear favourites now so no excuse for not winning it this year.

[Mike Sheehy]

Quote
"I am not just saying this after we have been beaten: I have said this consistently, that provincial championships will have to be changed or provincial winners will have to get a second shot at it," O'Connor said yesterday.


you did read the bit I have highlighted in bold right ?   JOC made the same comments even as we were winning the last 9 quarter finals. Your original point was that we are suddenly complaining about the qualifiers now that we were knocked out in the quarters which is bull.

I think you should concentrate on analyzing what is wrong with Mayo football rather than taking potshots at Kerry folk on the basis of imagined uproar in the Kingdom about the qualifiers system.