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There's a conversation to be had on the GAA's decision to put the biggest game of the football championship on free to air for sheer exposure, but I don't get people expecting the best games to be on RTE and for GAA+ to be some kind of spill-over service for the best of the rest games.

For GAA+ to be a success, they need big games to sell the service and to cover its costs. We can see GAA+ have high production values - they're not just throwing out 1-2 camera productions with commentary. Its a quality production with multiple cameras, on-site presentation, production teams etc. which comes at a heavy cost - and €95 for 40 games is very decent IMO.

RTE still bring over ~35 live games per season. There's no right for the best games to be free-to-air. And GAA+ couldn't bring us 40 additional games per season if it did.

I assume that it's a production company who take care of the technical side of things now, not sure if that's a change from when rte had a stake, but that might explain the difference in quality.

I disagree to a large extent, I do expect the bigger games to be on terrestrial tv and I think the gaa+ role should be to provide coverage of the lower profile games. I think if they did that in a similar vein to the likes of clubber, more coverage and lower quality, subscriptions could increase massively.

Surely the TV rights package would be worth substantially more if the successful bidder had first option on each weekend's games. In terms of a business model and revenue vs risk, it would surely make sense to maximise revenues from a low risk TV rights sale rather than try the current risk laden approach.

I'm not against pay-tv for gaa games, but I cannot understand why they haven't managed to link up with a terrestrial tv partner to have the service carried by a provider. Hidden away on a streaming device means no casual viewers and that's not good for any sport.
Being carried on a terrestrial platform would also get around the technical challenges that gaa+ presents to many people. I had to drive 50 miles to set up my father in law's tv last week so that he could watch the hurling on the big screen (and I fear I might have to do the same this weekend).

Ultimately I think the current approach is flawed and needs to be revisited. Maximising viewing numbers should be the goal and achieving that will drive the revenues that sustain the organisation into the future.

Kerry v Donegal to be shown on gaa+ at 3.00pm on a Saturday.
Cork v Meath to follow on gaa+ at 5.00pm

And then RTE get the big one at 7.30 - Galway v Kildare.

How's that for games promotion to the wider public and progressing the stated overriding objective of "promotion of gaelic games, culture and life long participation...".

Promotion of gaelic games does not mean everything is free all of the time. Is charging at the gate any different?
So much nonsense hyperbole around this. Gaa+ is available to a lot lot more gaelic people than RTE.

No offence, but the comment that gaa+ is available to a lot more gaelic people than rte is laughable.
I think what you're trying to say is that true gaelic people (who qualifies I'm not sure) will have gaa+, so what platform games are on is largely irrelevant to them. Which is exactly the point I'm making on promotion - the first real battle of true contenders, in a new format that few non gaelic people understand will be on viewable on a platform with a very, very limited numbers of domestic subscribers. If this were the prime time Saturday night game on terrestrial tv which it should be, it could easily be one of the top viewed programmes of the week with many multiples of viewers above what it will get. How do you think people become 'gaelic people'? By converting the casual viewer, by exposing your product, by making it desirable to play and attend because it's in the public consciousness.
Instead in a disappointingly shortsighted, but predictable effort to drive subscriptions to their new product it's only available on gaa+.  Luckily many probably have their dodgy boxes or nobody would get to see it!!

Kerry v Donegal to be shown on gaa+ at 3.00pm on a Saturday.
Cork v Meath to follow on gaa+ at 5.00pm

And then RTE get the big one at 7.30 - Galway v Kildare.

How's that for games promotion to the wider public and progressing the stated overriding objective of "promotion of gaelic games, culture and life long participation...".

Re the provincials, the semi finals are now more important than the final itself for the team aspiring to do well in the championship.

Probably more meaningful anyway. The draws being made at this time have really undermined the finals imo. Especially Kerry v cork, it's hard to imagine that Kerry will be totally focused on winning that 87th munster when they have donegal looming large on the horizon.

Maloney on commentary said Armagh got 8 fisted pts. Must be a record

People can complain about the fisted point all they want but it's up to Down to stop them getting to those areas.

I wasn't able to watch the first half in fairness as our club minors were playing. The opposition scored a fisted point in the last 2 minutes to bring it level and my first thought wasn't "Ffs a fisted point get it out of the game there's no skill in it" it was "Ffs they actually worked that really well".

Got the kickout away short when pitch was soaking (keeper showed some balls to do that a point down), didn't panic and worked it up the field, nobody took more than 1 touch until they got in our 45m roughly then they had another 10 handpasses maybe, no touches, movement everywhere, backdoor cut a few steps out from the endline. What would you want the young lad to do? Take on a goal that would be nearly physically impossible? Shoot on his right foot at a narrow angle? Cut back onto his left foot and get blocked down maybe?

Would genuinely like to hear

As the rules stand, the fisted point was the right option. I coach my underage team to take the fisted point for precisely the reasons you outlined.
But, it's not pretty and doesn't add to the spectacle, so I'd be very happy to see the option removed. Let him go for goal or play it across or whatever, either way most neutral spectators would prefer any other option than the no-risk fisted point
It only came in 30yrs ago, not hard to remove it. Anyone recall why it was introduced btw?

It's completely stupid. So the Ulster winner could draw Donegal and the Ulster loser could draw Cavan and you're better off losing Ulster.

The non-provincial finalists should be seeded by league position and the lowest seeds (Cavan, Kildare, Westmeath and Tyrone) should be drawn to play the provincial winners. At least that would make more sense.

Or even better, the provincial winners get a home draw and are seeded 1-4, seeds 5-8 are derived via league placing and also get a home draw. Provincial final rematches are not allowed in round 1, but that's it.

Lose the provincial final and there's a good chance you are away from home against a strong team - as things stand, I think this might be the beginning of the end for the provincials. Do 5 in a row seeking galway really give a feck? Similarly, Kerry? Armagh might, but just to scratch that itch and get those ulster medals to complete the set, but next year??
Will dubs come in for the leinster final v westmeath or wait the fortnight and go to the louth game instead??

The last time I saw this many 2 pointers the Harlem Globetrotters were playing.  I'm going to be counting 2 pointers in my sleep tonight!

Remarkable that Monaghan could stink the joint out for 55 minutes then steal a championship win.  We sure got to see the new rules in all their "glory" today.  I'm wondering how long we'll have to wait to see a team score 40 points and lose.

Then there is the Dublin "keep ball" alternative.  I did warn that the new rules would lead to 1) offences revolving around 2 pointers and 2) teams working the clock.

Last week we saw a Jim McGuinness defence shredded.  Do we conclude that the only way to defend 3v3 is to deny the opposition possession?

Quite a Saturday.  In Leinster, a cure for insomnia.  In Ulster, a 3 ring circus.

You surely did, and whilst that leinster game was horrible, it wasn't long ago that the majority of games were like that. Change was needed, but we do need a few tweaks.

Why any free worth 2 points, when a goal only worth 3.

Sure it was gonna be a 4pt goal til it wasn't

Why did they drop that one so early?

The 4 pt goal rule got a run out in the inter-pro trials in croker in Oct/Nov 24. They were dropped immediately afterwards because the frc was warned that Congress wouldn't vote the rules through if this was included. Apparently many delegates saw the amount of goals and chances in the trial games and felt that this would lead to even bigger drubbings in mismatched provincial championship games.
I won't comment on their mathematical abilities, but increasing the value of a relatively routine score by 100% might be seen as more likely to increase margins than increasing the value of a goal by 33%.

All in all, I can live with 2-pointers from play, the dessie ward score yesterday is an example of what we want, that and the countless examples that meath in particular have delivered. But should any of Derry's well worked team goals be worth just 1pt more than Beggan's routine 50m chip from in front of the posts??

Why any free worth 2 points, when a goal only worth 3.

It's ridiculous, that and the hooter are the two changes which have not improved the game at all. And before anyone starts rolling out the mantra that teams would be lining up to foul outside the arc, no they wouldn't - the mathematics would dictate that if you're close enough to foul, you'd better to let the player shoot as the under pressure 2-pt shot yields a lower expected value than a 1pt free from the same place.

Once again the ridiculous hooter proves to be a source of confusion. In what way does this improve the game in any fashion??
What worked better, the club championship model which has been employed for as long as I remember where the referee is in charge of time or this hybrid system where the referee and some technology in the stadium work together to provide complete transparency to all both within the stadium and watching on TV as to exactly how long is left?
Except of course that the tech doesn't work very well, and it's still arbitrary as it depends on when the ref feels the clock should be stopped and there is often misalignment between the ref version and the stadium version which leads to confusion. Prime examples were the endings of both normal and extra time in today's game.

Can we just please stop this awful experiment. At worst revert to last year's version, but preferably just go back to the old system.

If Kildare don't reach the leinster final, cavan are out of sam by my reckoning, one more upset somewhere and Tyrone are gone too!!!

Remarkable Derry with the pick of two U17 All-Ireland winning teams finds themselves out of this U20 championship before the semi-finals.

Semi final line up Wednesday 22nd April

Armagh v Monaghan
Donegal v Tyrone

Was there always a concern that those winning teams were very much built for a particular type of football that the old rules promoted. They never played with the type of freedom you'd like to see underage teams adopt and were very systematic in their approach.
I also understand that derry decided last year to take those winning teams pretty much en-bloc into the u20's squad and not look for talent playing senior football that had been missed by development squads net.
Hopefully the net will be cast wider for next year and they give the remaining minor winners a better chance to double up. I know we say it's a developmental grade, but for the majority of these lads this will be the pinnacle of their intercounty careers and a minor, under 20 double is a great story to tell the grandkids!!

Armagh v Kerry - Kerry by 2.5 - ARMAGH
Mayo v Roscommon - Mayo by 3.5 - MAYO
Galway v Dublin - Dublin by 1.5 - GALWAY
Monaghan v Donegal - Donegal by 5.5 - DONEGAL
Derry v Cavan - Derry by 4.5 - DERRY
Kildare v Louth - Louth by 0.5 - KILDARE
Offaly v Meath - Meath by 5.5 - MEATH
Tyrone v Cork - Cork by 1.5 - TYRONE
Limerick v Fermanagh - Fermanagh by 0.5 - LIMERICK
Sligo v Clare - Sligo by 0.5 - SLIGO
Wexford v Westmeath - Westmeath by 2.5 - WESTMEATH
Down v Laois - Down by 4.5 - DOWN
Antrim v London - Antrim by 5.5 - LONDON
Carlow v Leitrim - Carlow by 3.5 - LEITRIM
Longford v Wicklow - Wicklow by 2.5 - WICKLOW
Tipp v Waterford - Tipp by 5.5 - TIPPERARY

Sligo v Clare - COMBINED SCORE - 47 pts

Cork and Kerry can't meet until the final. Mayo will likely face Roscommon in the Connacht semi

Semi-finals

London/Mayo v New York/Roscommon

Sligo/Leitrim v Galway

In that scenario then it would be highly unlikely that Tyrone won't be playing for Sam. The only way would be if an Ulster team reached the final below them. Down ?

Sligo had galway beat 2 years ago until walsh saved them with a last minute goal.

Is it beyond the realms of possibility that cork stumble in munster once again?

If derry hear cork are winning, they could lose focus and nothing to say cavan wouldn't take advantage. I fancy Kildare to turn over louth regardless, so a Tyrone loss has the potential to turn into all sorts of problems. You'd strongly fancy them to win the TC all the same, if they can keep their players around!

With the potential for TC looming, coupled with this being their last game pre-championship and starting spots on the line, it's unlikely they won't be going all out for the win here.

[compromised on the 2 pt idea by abolishing the 2 pt frees?]

Why can you not go backwards on a solo and go. Surely there are times when that would be advantageous to not have to try and go through a couple of groups of players or to make a better angle for a pass.

It was to promote forward play, the minute you encourage players to take the safe route they'll take it, possession is key, and that's why we've had the changes. to come away from the safe option and provide excitement

Summed up nicely.

The new rules were devise largely to restore the balance of territory vs possession. Any rule change that promotes possession would fly in the face of what's trying to be achieved.

Also, couldn't they have compromised on the 2 pt idea by abolishing the 2 pt frees?  It's only a matter of time before every team has a Sean O'Se and 2 point frees begin to look as routine as a conversion in American football.

Abolishing 2 point frees makes no sense. Otherwise when someone is lining up a 2 pointer attempt from play you can just foul them knowing the punishment is only a one point free attempt from 40m+.
If you have 2 pointers from play you have to have 2 pointer frees.

The statistians would make the decision easy.
Expected points against if you let them attempt the 2 pointer: 1.2*
Expected points against if you foul them: 0.78*
(wild estimates but safe to say the first figure would be significantly bigger than the second)

Except that actually it's the reverse according to the admittedly sparse stats available. Expected value of easiest 2 pt attempt from play with no pressure is about 1.3pts going down to 0.7pts under heavy pressure (which you would need if you want to be close enough to foul). You'd imagine a free from that top of the D position is about 90% conversion, therefore 1.8pts currently or 0.9pts if the free was worth 1pt. As angles change and kicks from play get more difficult you'd expect the gap to widen. What statisticians will be encouraging then is to try and draw the foul when outside the arc if at all possible.