Railway Cup 2007

[darbyo]

Leo I think most GAA fans would disagree with you there.

I disagree with that.

Players from smaller counties have the oppurtunity to play with the best players in Ireland and winning a Railway Cup medal is probably a major honour as a provincial title or winning the All Ireland is merely a dream.

Again I disagree with this and I also think you're being quite condescending to players from the weaker counties. I'd wager quite a bit that none of the loosing players were as despondent as they'd be if they had lost a county/provincial/AI final or indeed a knockout championship game. Nor were there wild celebrations across Munster and Ulster last night as the conquering hero's returned. In a packed calendar it's surely time to face the facts and let the thing die.

[Gnevin]

I heard the GAA left tickets in Bus depots around Dublin for free just to try to get some sort of a crowd

[Pangurban]

I remember the Hey-Days of this competition when it meant something, sad to see it die, but best give it a decent burial and move on, its finished

[orangeman]

If they put it on before the club finals on 17th March- they'd get a big gate - try it next year and see before a decent burial is given to the competition.

[jodyb]

I heard the GAA left tickets in Bus depots around Dublin for free just to try to get some sort of a crowd

If they did Gnevin, I wish i'd known about it. My kids and i were directed to 4 different 'Outlets' before we actually found one in operation. We were walking for 40 minutes round in circles and 5 different stewarts sent us to non existant sales points.

They've got a pretty good office at the cusack side of the park. Why didnt they just sell the tickets from there and another one one at Jones road. If anything, yuda thought they were trying to discourage attendance. F#ckin Joke!!!

You dont have to kill off the Railway Cup - it died a long tiome ago so just give it a decent burial. Basically no-one is interested except some neanderthal provincial officials and those (elite!) players who are mysteriously affected by burn out earlier in the year but want more meaningless games now.
And any crowd in Croke Park less than 40,000 creates an adverse image of GAA - strange but true.No amount of martketing in the world,, free tickets, etc will get anywhere near that attendance and the fact that we need to contemplate such gimmicks tells us all we need to know about the value of this competition.
Players who missed out on Sam or Liam might want consoaltion baubles of some sort - not a good enough reason for prolonging this agony.

imaginative ads on TV as well?
[/quote]

Did you see Tómas O' Se last night? Did you see Kieran Donaghy? They knocked their bollox in. the players regard the competition very highly.

I was among 70,000 in the p'ssin rain at a comp rules game 4 years ago. If the railway cup had a fraction of the publicity and promotion that that game had, it would definitely get a crowd. Anyone who regularly attends knows that they are generally great games to watch (though last nights didn't rank among the best of them). Instead of taking the games to Paris and the like, just promote them a bit. it's not that complicated

[orangeman]

Would it be really ? This year there were plenty of days where there were 3 games in Croker ........

[orangeman]

Well if the players were special and there was a good club final double, it would be well worth going to, would it not ? I think it should be tried.

[seamusthebard]

You dont have to kill off the Railway Cup - it died a long tiome ago so just give it a decent burial. Basically no-one is interested except some neanderthal provincial officials and those (elite!) players who are mysteriously affected by burn out earlier in the year but want more meaningless games now.
And any crowd in Croke Park less than 40,000 creates an adverse image of GAA - strange but true.No amount of martketing in the world,, free tickets, etc will get anywhere near that attendance and the fact that we need to contemplate such gimmicks tells us all we need to know about the value of this competition.
Players who missed out on Sam or Liam might want consoaltion baubles of some sort - not a good enough reason for prolonging this agony.

I agree with every sentiment you expressed Leo. I am sick with those elite players who are still "proud to represent their province"- total ballocks- some want to improve their waning egos. Finish this nonsense. Did some ulster player not play in the semi-final last week as his club had a relegation game on Sunday- enough said- last night was embarrassing- bury it immediately.

[orangeman]

How was it embarassing ? I didn't think it was embarassing at all - do you mean the small crowd ?

[blueboy]

Does anyone know what the attendance was on Saturday? I haven't actually seen it anywhere.

[orangeman]

Did they give free tickets out seriously ? If so , why didn't they give them out to the schools ?

[Jinxy]

Four games in one day would be a bit much, Orangeman.

I honestly don't think that's the issue though. Some people would come for 2 games, some would come for 3 and some would come for all 4. It's not about getting everyone in there for the full day. The idea should be to promote it as a festival of gaelic games and get tourists strolling down Jones's Road. You would get a very good walk-up crowd and expose the games to overseas visitors. Seriously, with a bit of promotion it could become a fantastic annual event where you could see the local heroes and the countymen all strutting their stuff on the same field. Like I said already, throw in a bit of music and entertainment and you're on to a winner. What would the problem be with this?

[orangeman]

Here here Jinxy !

[Tankie]

I heard the GAA left tickets in Bus depots around Dublin for free just to try to get some sort of a crowd

It's a pity Leinster are shite and can't make it to the final in either sport.

Or maybe if you fair weather boys had of got off ur asses and turned up there would have been a bigger crowd. Cheers for your "interest" tho. the whole thing is a joke and should be scrapped because it is very clear that there is no interest in the competition from the fans side.

[Jinxy]

Hold on, if you have 4 games, that means sitting there for 5/6 hours. Add in this "entertainment", how long do you want this show to go on?

You don't have to sit there for the whole thing. It's a personal choice. The main event for most people would still be the club finals but a lot of those people would get there early to watch the railway cup finals. Get the tourists in early and plenty of them will hang around. Sure you can get locked in Croker just as quickly as you will anywhere else.