FRC Part 2. The 8 team provinces?

[fearglasmor]

1.  Eliminate O'Byrne, McKenna and all meaningless competitions.
2.  Eliminate the Leagues.
3.  Leave Provinces intact and give them April to May to run their competitions as stand alones in whatever format they want.
4.  Run the All Ireland series in conference format along the lines of NFL and  retaining q/f, s/f, final format from Jun to Sep
5.  Drop compromise rules and leave Oct to March completely free to clubs
6.  6 months Club games, 6 months intercounty. Every gaa player in the country knows where they stand.

[muppet]

The conference idea proposed over a decade ago by a committee including Colm O'Rourke, Martin Carney etc was the most sensible approach I thought.

2 conferences of 10 teams making up the top 20 teams.
The rest play in a 2nd division conference for promotion/relegation to/from the top two conferences.

Ulster/Connacht conference made up of top 10 teams.
All play all league over 10/11 weeks.
Top two Ulster teams play Ulster Final.
Top two Connacht tams play Connacht Final.

Leinster/Munster conference does the same.

2 semi-finals
AIF.

12 rounds.

Could be played off over 16 weeks leaving a larger season for the clubs.

Not perfect but it guarantees loads of meaningful games. And it can be run over a shorter, better planned season. It protects local rivalries and the Provincial Finals. Every team would have at least 4 home Championship games and at least 9 in total.

[blewuporstuffed]

I also think only the middle division would be really competitive as a lot of teams could end up with no relegation or promotion goals with 3 or 4 rounds left in div 1 & 3.

I am wary of this too, maybe a similar format to what i have suggested may be workable as well with the current 4 divisions?
I am a fan of the provincial championships to be honest and would like them retained as a stand alone competition.

I like the idea of having a big 'last 16' competion that can be promoted as the flagship of our games and for the smaller counties, getting to that big stage alone would be a goal.
It would leave 15 BIG games  that could be televised and promoted (similar to the sweet 16 college basketball in the states), an i would imagine would gain big attendances.

As for the monirs and U21s , is there any reason why they cant follow the same format?

The Sweet 16 in the states is just the 3rd round of the NCAA tournament which starts out as 64 teams, and the sweet 16 regularly features #12 seeds and lower from each of the regions (effectively the 48th ranked teams and up).

In fact the NCAA tournament is very close to what the GAA are talking about with the equal 'provinces' except they call them regions, and they are not really geographically based on the teams, but on the venues. So you'll have 4 'Regions' of 16 teams each.

Maybe my understanding of the sweet 16 in the states is incorrect then.

What i really am talking about is a last 16 knockout competition to win the all ireland. thats 15 big championship games in total, whcih can all be televised live. (using super sundays or sat eve/sunday as appropriate.

[StephenC]

Been saying for years to buck the current provincial system. Hard luck Fermanagh but we cannot wait around forever.

8x4 makes sense. We don't really need Donegal anyway. It never felt Ulsterish.

Only cause you were feeling the wrong part.

[macdanger2]

An Inter county season finishing in June or 1st week in July  as suggested by AZ and ZULU WON'T be happenin lads.
NFL every 2nd week from 1st weekend in Feb with Club Leagues on the in between weekend.
No NFL Semi finals so NFL 2/2,16/2,2/3,16/3,30/3,13/4,27/4 and play offs/Finals May weekend. A player can only be one 1IC Panel at any given time so U21 Championship to be played NFL weekends.
Provincials as they are but dates as follows
Prelims 11/5
Qtrs 25/5
Semis 15/6
Finals 5&6 July
Qualifiers to be rebranded as simply All Ireland Championship
Round 1 14/6
Round 2 5/7
Round 3 12/7
Round 4  19/7
AI QFs 26/27 July
AI SFs 16/17 Aug - both same weekend
AIF 8/9.
Club players can be told to take their Summer holidays early/mid July by which time they should all be at Qtr Final stages so some lads would only have Leagues left anyway while the rest could get a break before the serious business begins.

Loss in TV revenue makes something like this a no-go I'd say

[DJGaliv]

I'd worry that the inevitability of paying the players will be a major consideration for Vatican 2. This may be 20 years down the line, but it is becoming more and more likely and I think the GAA know this.

While we are thinking a lot about the average club player, provincial championships etc, Vatican 2 will be equally concerned with what will best serve the TV people and the revenue generators with the aim of having enough cash to pay the players.

This would mean guaranteeing counties numerous regular fixtures that will get big gates and big tv viewership.

[Stall the Bailer]

Any new plan needs the Provincial Championships as they fund the Provincial Councils.
Doing away with them will also mean changing how the game is governed.
Along with tradition etc, it is a non runner. Any proposals without the Provincial Championships are best ignored, unless they show how the funding and governing changes are to work.

Also a good point made about having at least one (or three) championship game on tv each weekend. This may mean football one week and hurling the next week or two provinces playing one week and the others playing the following week.

There is still great potential for good change which would help the club scene.

[AZOffaly]

I'd worry that the inevitability of paying the players will be a major consideration for Vatican 2. This may be 20 years down the line, but it is becoming more and more likely and I think the GAA know this.

While we are thinking a lot about the average club player, provincial championships etc, Vatican 2 will be equally concerned with what will best serve the TV people and the revenue generators with the aim of having enough cash to pay the players.

This would mean guaranteeing counties numerous regular fixtures that will get big gates and big tv viewership.

Professionalism would change the landscape entirely. At that point club v county becomes as immaterial as it is for club v province in the rugby. You could do what you wanted to then in terms of coming up with a 'product' that would see tickets and TV rights. That's what professionalism would be all about. Professionalism is not just about paying players, it becomes about the entire commercial viability of the product.

[Zulu]

This would mean guaranteeing counties numerous regular fixtures that will get big gates and big tv viewership.

I really don't see professional GAA as a realistic option but amateur or professional the above should always be one of our main goals.

Any new plan needs the Provincial Championships as they fund the Provincial Councils.

Disagree, while the provincial championships do help fund the provinces they also get money from central funds. If there was one centrally run competition why wouldn't each county get a share of the profits like they do know?

Can't you simply have provincial councils and county boards but with a central banker in CP who distributes to counties and provinces who require it?

Whatever about tradition and giving weaker counties a realistic ambition of success I don't see any grounds for objection on the business side of it.

[DJGaliv]

This would mean guaranteeing counties numerous regular fixtures that will get big gates and big tv viewership.

I really don't see professional GAA as a realistic option but amateur or professional the above should always be one of our main goals.

I would agree that we won't be solely professional, but there will certainly be an element of semi-professionalism whereby players can be confident in having a basic wage of a few grand a year.

The big problem with semi-professionalism coming in would be how to structure the games to allow for it. They need to lay the groundworks first.

You can't have one lad working from January to June, and another lad working from January until September and they both get paid the same. How this is restructured will be interesting.

In semi-professional soccer in the UK with limited TV money and moderate attendences lads are all roughly on 40 week contracts - i.e. not paid for the off season.

I would envisage we will head to a more serious league structure within the championship that guarantees games, rather than one team finishing their season in June. If for example Dublin were to lose in the backdoor to Tyrone this year that's a huge cash cow slaughtered in July.

Does anyone think that Sky Sports will be offering some unofficial friendly advice on how best to restructure and sell our game? Or is that as ridiculous as Boylan's vitamins?

[Rossfan]

So it's all down to Sky???
After 126 years of Gaelic Games it's all going to change because Sky are going to show 20 games?
God but ye all have so little faith in the Good Ship GAA - or is it more of the "end of the GAA as we know it" mentality whereby every change in a vibrant living body is going to ruin everything we hold dear.

As for the FRC2 - a few good ideas in their full report but it's like they were only given a few weeks to throw something together e.g they say Minor should be reduced to 17 but don't mention U21 at all which would in all reality have to become U20 in that case.
They are totally stuck on the 4 eights "Province" thingy and the piece at the start of this thread sticks with that saying there may be other ways to achieve this.
It's hard to do a "whilte paper" discussion document on anything if you've only one outcome in mind before you put pen to paper.

[thewobbler]

Does anyone think that Sky Sports will be offering some unofficial friendly advice on how best to restructure and sell our game? Or is that as ridiculous as Boylan's vitamins?

I've absolutely no doubt that Sky, if the market exists, will generate umpteen ideas that might help improve product awareness and scope.

But there's this wonderful thing we have called Congress. Sky can't do a damn thing about what Congress decides.

As a result, should any of Sky's ideas come to fruition, it will be on our heads, not theirs.

[thejuice]

I've been in favour of this for a long time. It will be a boost to the provincial championships. More competitiveness as well as potentially giving teams a better chance of winning silverware.

My restructuring would be like this:

LEINSTER:
Meath
Dublin
Louth
Kildare
Westmeath
Wicklow
Carlow
London

CONNAGHT:
Mayo
Roscommon
Galway
Leitrim
Sligo
Donegal
Longford
Offaly

MUNSTER:
Kerry
Cork
Clare
Limerick
Tipperary
Waterford
Wexford
Laois

ULSTER:
Armagh
Cavan
Monaghan
Tyrone
Down
Antrim
Derry
Fermanagh

[Rossfan]

I've been in favour of this for a long time. It will be a boost to the provincial championships. More competitiveness as well as potentially giving teams a better chance of winning silverware.

My restructuring would be like this:

LEINSTER:
Meath
Dublin
Louth
Kildare
Westmeath
Wicklow
Carlow
London

CONNAGHT:
Mayo
Roscommon
Galway
Leitrim
Sligo
Donegal
Longford
Offaly
MUNSTER:
Kerry
Cork
Clare
Limerick
Tipperary
Waterford
Wexford
Laois
ULSTER:
Armagh
Cavan
Monaghan
Tyrone
Down
Antrim
Derry
Fermanagh

Fixed a few geographical errors for you there.

[BennyHarp]

If we are going to randomly force counties into other provinces we may as well just pull 4 random groups of 8 out of a hat and call the groups Ulster, Munster, Connaght and Leinster. Maybe we could end up with no northern teams in the Ulster Championship?