The Elephant in the room

[Captain Scarlet]

The talk of what we might prefer in terms of a product is not something I'm swayed by. We would all love to see the best teams playing classic games at inter-county but we will follow our own clubs and counties no matter how crap or the level they play at.

The GAA should not be making decisions based on fans and armchair supporters. As it stands the players all love games week in week out. The managers can manage their workload and are more than happy to flog them for months on end and would stick in a few challenge matches if they could.

If we went back and just dragged the season out more there would be more dead rubbers. Going way back to straight knock-out times I don't remeber anyone saying that it was awful a team had no games fo X months after all they put in.

There are plenty of games now but I do like the idea of an odd gap as we get to the business end of it. Like who are we tweaking this for? Thousands of kids go to the nuerseries around the country to actually play the games. Then they might go home an watch Liverpool...what harm there? Isn't the main thing that they are playing the games?!
I'll never buy the exposure arguement when most county managers don't let their lads near a mic or do any promo content.

[tiempo]

Two weeks in a row at the start of the league Donegal had injuries, week 1 Jim blamed the new rules, week 2 he blamed the drive to Kerry, neither week did he (who is in control of workload and warm up) consider the content he's putting on as being root cause

2 weeks ago Caolan McGonagle went off injured v Tyrone, at the weekend he wasn't named in the panel for the game v Cavan, then he starts the match, in the role of god-like guru these are the kind of inner workings of the mind that give an edge it seems

[Captain Scarlet]

Two weeks in a row at the start of the league Donegal had injuries, week 1 Jim blamed the new rules, week 2 he blamed the drive to Kerry, neither week did he (who is in control of workload and warm up) consider the content he's putting on as being root cause

2 weeks ago Caolan McGonagle went off injured v Tyrone, at the weekend he wasn't named in the panel for the game v Cavan, then he starts the match, in the role of god-like guru these are the kind of inner workings of the mind that give an edge it seems

This is something I NEVER understand. Why don't any GAA journalists or pundits mention the facs of 100s of training sessions and no real recovery?!
As I said if they have a gap week they are driving around the country looking for behind closed doors games.

The GPA never seem to mind these demands as they frame it as 'the GAA' - Jarlath has them running on the beaches at 7am seemingly...

[tiempo]

GPA are interested in billables, faux outrage and pushing a narrative on populist issues

I think a big hand in Dublins glory years was the fact their players will have done comparatively less travelling for training and games through the season, slept in their own beds the night before big games at Croke and so on

Up the country you have to cut your cloth accordingly, lads are due time off to unplug and decompress from the rigors of competition, even during a competition, at the end of the day people-athletes are driven in large part by hormones, burning the candle at both ends is going to come back to bite you in the ass, you can't be 100% wired in/in the zone ready for battle 5-6-7 days a week

Really and truly between the Tyrone and Cavan games if Jim had said right lads take the week off, bar rehab we'll convene on Sunday for the game there's every chance they still win the game, this hundreds of sessions malarkey and alpha guru thing is overblown at times

[joemamas]

Digressing a bit, but still on point.
Everyone (well most) agree that football has been refreshingly good this year.
personally, I cannot watch enough of it, after years of almost giving up on it.
Ok, so if you are a company making a product, lets use Apple IPhone, and it is popular and everyone wants it, what would you do. Increase production, make it more available to consumers.
What do the GAA do, put a restrictive availability on their product.
Four week from today June 29th, there will be four teams left in the 2025 championship.
Six weeks from today, there will be two.
Eight weeks from today, it will be all over by July 27th.
You could not make it up.
Roll on the premier league and Rugby   

Yeah let's go back to having a month between provincial finals and the All Ireland semis, and the same again between the semis and the AI final.

That'll help with whatever it is you think we need help with.

Yeah that's what we need.

Super idea.

yep, that was exactly my point, have a month between all games, 
I should have spelt it out, that extending the intercounty season by ONE or TWO weeks, would not hurt.
I feel the whole thing is too condensed.
That was my point.

[Milltown Row2]

Digressing a bit, but still on point.
Everyone (well most) agree that football has been refreshingly good this year.
personally, I cannot watch enough of it, after years of almost giving up on it.
Ok, so if you are a company making a product, lets use Apple IPhone, and it is popular and everyone wants it, what would you do. Increase production, make it more available to consumers.
What do the GAA do, put a restrictive availability on their product.
Four week from today June 29th, there will be four teams left in the 2025 championship.
Six weeks from today, there will be two.
Eight weeks from today, it will be all over by July 27th.
You could not make it up.
Roll on the premier league and Rugby   

Yeah let's go back to having a month between provincial finals and the All Ireland semis, and the same again between the semis and the AI final.

That'll help with whatever it is you think we need help with.

Yeah that's what we need.

Super idea.

yep, that was exactly my point, have a month between all games, 
I should have spelt it out, that extending the intercounty season by ONE or TWO weeks, would not hurt.
I feel the whole thing is too condensed.
That was my point.

So, in essence, the complaining is about making it all a week or two longer? That's it?

Pre groups/back doors, super 8's and all the other stuff we had was you at most would play 5 games if in Ulster and it started in mid June and over in September, most counties got one game and it wasn't broken in my mind at the time, now we have multiple games which extend the year in terms of games the jeopardy is gone as the stronger teams have an opportunity to get back in, the reality is, when you strip it all back is money, revenue from all the games and TV rights

I personally think there are too many games, an over saturation of the games isn't necessary a good thing but, I've enjoyed most of the games this year, maybe the new rules have jazzed it up   
 

[Ciarrai_thuaidh]

I know there is an argument/narrative starting to develop that canning this group phase format is a terrible idea as it's great and there's some good games etc etc..but do people not think that Round of 16 knockout leading to Quarter finals will 1)Give Teams a bit more recovery time in between games and 2)Allow a better build up to big games, more promotion of them etc?

This has been said before I'm sure but 24 games for 16 teams to get rid of only 4 is an unnecessarily drawn out process. I think this current structure with top 2 going straight to Quarters would be better probably and if that leads to dead rubbers then so be it.

But the Round 2A/2B system for next year is worth trying. Ironically, Cork of all county's used to have this format for club championships a few years back and I thought it worked well. Teams next season have their provincial games, then have a back door game if they lose Rd1 of All Ireland series and if they lose Rd2B are out, so every team is getting a third chance. Can't complain too much about that? The winners of winners round 2A gets a break week (or 2?) ahead of Quarter finals.

All this being said I long for the day where we would have a complete open draw system for the All Ireland Series in an AFL type format. Teams play each other home and away. Miles off it at the moment because of provincial council power of course.

[thewobbler]

Digressing a bit, but still on point.
Everyone (well most) agree that football has been refreshingly good this year.
personally, I cannot watch enough of it, after years of almost giving up on it.
Ok, so if you are a company making a product, lets use Apple IPhone, and it is popular and everyone wants it, what would you do. Increase production, make it more available to consumers.
What do the GAA do, put a restrictive availability on their product.
Four week from today June 29th, there will be four teams left in the 2025 championship.
Six weeks from today, there will be two.
Eight weeks from today, it will be all over by July 27th.
You could not make it up.
Roll on the premier league and Rugby   

Yeah let's go back to having a month between provincial finals and the All Ireland semis, and the same again between the semis and the AI final.

That'll help with whatever it is you think we need help with.

Yeah that's what we need.

Super idea.

yep, that was exactly my point, have a month between all games, 
I should have spelt it out, that extending the intercounty season by ONE or TWO weeks, would not hurt.
I feel the whole thing is too condensed.
That was my point.

But I think you might be missing a key point of what's so good, now that the competition format has blended with the new rules. Ie that as there's no elongated bloat between games all fans can look forward to more and get sated quickly, that injuries, tiredness and suspensions add significant jeopardy, that managers have so little time to prepare and reset for the opposition that they have to focus mainly on their own  game.

I'm not saying it's perfect. But it is getting closer to what NFL (gridiron) has, which is the best competition format of all; one in which seeding clearly helps but doesn't determine your season, one in which winning comes to down to small margins (including luck), one which requires the "manliness" of playing through pain barriers, alongside skill and tactics, one that rides a wave of national attention for a short but very focused period.

[BigGreenField]

More time would just be filled by more training or challenge games behind closed doors. Possibly this way players might get some time off to be fresh for games.


 Complaints are really about a loss of control, the chaos in individual matches and from one week to the next is a good thing.

[The Trap]

This may be the best thread to post this as its definitely a BIG elephant in the room.

Does anyone at the top care about club football?

3 stories I have read today:

A survey to be undertaken on the amateur status and all it talks about is county football. Do they not realise how much is being spent by each club? Overall it would dwarf what is spent on county teams. And the players are putting collosal effort in a lot of cases. Yet the amount of REAL games they get each year is embarrassing.

Tom Dempsey of Wexford saying the young people won't get a chance to see their heroes as Wexford are out of the hurling championship. Do these lads not play for their clubs? Can the young people not have local heroes and see and know them up close?

Poacher saying that the Leitrim lads can rest for a few weeks and then get onto S&C and get ready for next year. Do they not have clubs to go and play for?

All focus is on county football. When are clubs fighting back?

[Captain Scarlet]

That's a fair point but I do think the GAA show their support for the clubs in terms of grants, coaching, etc. Look at the Cúl Camps - a huge movement and massive success that will have thousands of kids buzzing and in their gear.

But the national media and plenty in it barely have a clue of the Tailteann Cup or the likes, so what hope has the clubs.
County managers warring with clubs helped to push the split season and then some joirnos were not keen on split season as they would have to actually find stories (and there are so many great ones).