Meeting of Grassroots to Discuss our Strategy re GPA

[darbyo]

Just for the sake of arguing darbyo (as I disagree with this all on principle) but, how would you feel if someone took away a couple of thousand euro from your salary and gave you the same explanation? Would you be that enthused coming into work the next day? The reality is that the players will get used to it and expect it and be demotivated if they don't get it. Is it so outlandish to suggest that another GPA strike would be in the offing so as to get the GAA to pony up in such circumstances?

The government is giving this money to elite GAA players in line with the tax breaks that other top level sports people get. Are you saying that if the country took a turn for the worse and the government tightened the belt by removing these tax breaks and stopping the grant, that IC county players and professional soccer and rugby players would 'down tools'? Can you imagine Brian O'Driscoll making a bee line for the IRFU looking for the equivalent money if the tax break was halted? I can't, neither can I see GAA players turning around to the GAA and demanding that they pony up. You are attempting to paint IC players as money mad, selfish, and insensitive to everyone else, and all because they have looked for the government to treat them as they do other elite field sports men in this country.
                    The money is so small as to barely matter to any player, of course you'd rather have an extra 2K but the government also used to give 3K to first time buyers, but when I got my house it was gone. What did people do? They just got on with it because this type of thing happens. If my employer took 3K off my paycheck that would be different but your wage and a government grant are very different things.
                     I don't think the players are greedy at all, like most other people if the govt. give them money they'll take it. Why would players strike against the GAA if the government stops paying them? And even if they did they'd lose as no-one supports pay for play, and the players are not going to give up their IC careers over €800-2.5K.
                      I respect many of you are concerned about where this could bring the GAA. But I really believe you have convinced yourselves that this can only end in disaster and therefore are incapable of seeing any other future. Not one person has yet to come on here and articulate how this doomsday scenario is going to play out. If one of you could satisfactorily answer this question I might see how professionalism could be a reality one day. How can an amateur organisation go professional against the wishes of the vast majority of members? How can this happen when members from the very top to the very bottom are against this and professionalism could only happen after the whole organisation got to vote on it?

[FTJC]

This "the money is small" argument is ridiculous. How small could this money be in 10 years time? This is the thin end of a pay-for-play/ semi-professionalism wedge.

At the end of the day the money is taxable by the revenue which will in time lead to a Bosman stiuation where players could move county at will.

The GAA membership were never consulted about this agreement whereby county boards are being asked to pay players a grant in direct contravention of Rule 11. So basically Nickey Brennan is asking GAA members to break the rules of the association.

If the central council reject these proposals(which they should) then let the GPA dish out the government money themselves if they wish. But the GAA should have no involvement in this business whatsoever.

[darbyo]

This "the money is small" argument is ridiculous. How small could this money be in 10 years time? This is the thin end of a pay-for-play/ semi-professionalism wedge.

At the end of the day the money is taxable by the revenue which will in time lead to a Bosman stiuation where players could move county at will.

No it's not ridiculous, what I said is factually correct, your argument is ridiculous simply because it is your opinion of what might happen in the future. It has no basis in fact at all, it can't do because you are taking about the future. And players can move county as it is, Thomas Walsh anyone? Debate this issue on facts not on physic premonitions.

Darbyo, if they are not money mad then they are certainly being lead by an individual who is money mad. They did threaten to down tools if they did not get this sum of money, so they have already set the precedent of threatening to down tools over a small sum.

Yes but this was done to focus minds and it worked. But if they were to strike over the GAA taking up the slack then they'd be on their own. In fact I think many players wouldn't support a leadership who went this route. And still no-one has answered the question I have posed. If anyone is going to argue that this will lead to pay for play then, for them to be taken seriously, they must have an idea of how it could come to pass.

[orangeman]

Thomas Walsh's transfer - was it led or at least influenced by money ??

[pintsofguinness]

How can an amateur organisation go professional against the wishes of the vast majority of members?

They are ready to introduce grants against the wishes of the vast majority of members - excuse me if I don't have as much faith as you.

[darbyo]

Whatever the reasons for TW transfer is just proves that players can already move for various reasons, this grant won't change things in that regard. POG, firstly the wishes of the majority haven't been established, secondly you can't be comparing the grants to professionalism.
               Again I ask, who will force through professionalism and how can they do so when at least one rule will need to change and for that to happen 2/3 of the membership have to vote for it. So one last time with feeling, by what mechanism can professionalism come into the GAA unless the vast majority of members want it to?

[orangeman]

The mechanism which the GPA believe that this can come about is by that word STRIKE !

[darbyo]

Is that your answer? I'm sorry lads but if that's the best you can come up with then it appears ye have no idea of what you're talking about. Your arguement seems to have boiled down to, 'I know what's going to happen in the future, how do I know?...I just do'

[pintsofguinness]

POG, firstly the wishes of the majority haven't been established, secondly you can't be comparing the grants to professionalism.
               Again I ask, who will force through professionalism and how can they do so when at least one rule will need to change and for that to happen 2/3 of the membership have to vote for it. So one last time with feeling, by what mechanism can professionalism come into the GAA unless the vast majority of members want it to?

I think we all know who's the majority.
What's to say a 20 euro a week grant doesn't become a **** euro a week grant with people claiming it isn't professionalism?

I know it's the worst possible scenario but we have to protect ourselves against that - the idea that "it'll never happen" will be useless if it does happen.  You are basing on views of what will happen 10 years down the line if we have our current membership with the current attitude - we might not have that!  As I said, we'll have a generation of members and players who are use to county players being handed cheques. 

[pintsofguinness]

Again from orchardcounty...

DUFFY'S BACKING FOR GRANTS SCHEME

The player grants scheme has received a major boost ahead of today's (Saturday 8th December) crunch Central Council meeting with the GAA's incoming director general Paraic Duffy expressing his support for it.

Despite opposition in some quarters, the scheme is expected to be rubberstamped by Central Council before the finer details can be thrashed out.

Speaking at Thursday night's Monaghan convention, at which he was guest of honour, Duffy assured delegates that the proposed funding does not affect the GAA's amateur status, nor will it impact on other Government funding.

However, he warned other issues could affect the Association's amateur status like "paying managers and coaches and not letting on."

The Scotstown clubman added that the money is "recognition by the State of the work that inter-county players put in and should not and cannot be regarded as pay for play".

[Guillem2]

Why does he call it "work"?

[full back]

IMHO the big deal here is the threatened STRIKE
If the grants are given out starting now & ending in 3 years what is going to happen after this time-frame?
Does pro-grant supporters honestly think in 3 years time players are going to be happy if no money is forthcoming or even if the same amount is given out again?
In 9 years time I dont think 'elite' players will settle for 2k euro
What then?
Previous experience tells us a strike will be called again - so in essence when GPA/players demands arent met IC games are stopped
To me this is the start of a slippery slope

[Bensars]

Just read this on Hogan Stand. Think the author sums up the majority view againtst the "awards" formally know as grants

The Future That's Ahead Of Us: An Email From a Limerick Rugby Man
I read Mark Conway's article in the Irish Independent today. He makes some excellent points. I am not what you would consider a GAA man. I go to the Limerick games, but I am a rugby player. What the GAA have done now is what rugby did 10 years ago.

Ten years ago, at twenty years of age, I played in a thriving club scene. Then clubs started paying players. So players migrated to the clubs that paid the better money. To compete, other clubs increased the amount they paid and the circle went on until the clubs went bankrupt and every volunteer a club had stopped working for the club. "Why should I do the club draw/mark the pitches/wash the jerseys/man the bar/coach the team/etc for nothing when so-and-so is getting £50 for playing on a Saturday?"

Club rugby is dead in Ireland. We have an elite of 30 rugby players in Ireland, there are 98 other professionals who fill the gaps. No-one plays club anymore. Clubs who fielded 8 adult teams ten years ago, struggle to field 3 now. There are numerous reasons for this, but one is definitely professionalism. Most clubs are now two clubs within a club - the paid first team and the rest. The rest wonder why they bother.

I played on the first team in three clubs (I moved as I moved cities for work). I was offered pay in all. My parish club in Limerick, whose games I attended since I was old enough to go and watch my dad and for whom my only childhood ambition was to play on the first XV, wanted to pay me for what I loved doing.

I played on a team with my three brothers, for my parish, representing my family and my community. This is the 'place' Mark talks about. This is sport and there is no greater feeling that this - the feeling you belong and that you are wearing a jersey your father wore, that you are only minding it to pass on to the next generation.

My heroes where the guys who played on the first team before me. They coached and supported me now. How could I take pay for play when they didn't? How could I look them in the eye? I couldn't and refused the money.

And whilst we are on sacrifice - I trained six days a week and played two games a week (college and club) - I trained twice a day some days and at least once a day at the time. But it wasn't sacrifice, I loved it. I preferred playing than working in a bar earning pocket money.

If you don't love it, don't do it. Someone else will gladly take your place. If it's money you want, take an extra job. As a first team player (or county player), you are in the most privileged position in your sport. Everyone wants to swap places with you. Everyone wants what you have.

And you are only minding that jersey, hanging onto it as long as you can. Cos a hell of a lot went before you, a hell of a lot more will come after you. It's only the efforts of everyone that has helped put you in that position (starting with your parents and the coaches you had in your club since you started).

I admire the GAA greatly. I'd urge that you don't go down the pay for play route. You have something very special in your organisation.

Keep it.
J , Galway Ireland , 07/12/2007 at 16:06

[darbyo]

I think we all know who's the majority.

No we don't. The people who make the most noise aren't necessarily the majority.

What's to say a 20 euro a week grant doesn't become a **** euro a week grant with people claiming it isn't professionalism?

If the government want to give them a €80,000 per year grant then fine, but they won't. If players ever get a living wage off someone it will have to be the GAA but that can't happen unless we want it to.

You are basing on views of what will happen 10 years down the line if we have our current membership with the current attitude - we might not have that!  As I said, we'll have a generation of members and players who are use to county players being handed cheques.  

I don't know what age you are POG but I have at least 30 years (hopefully) of invovement in the GAA to come. Most people of a similar age to me that I have spoken to don't agree with professionalism, so there will be plenty of opponents for the foreseeable future. Anyway the only people that will get used to getting checks are the IC players who make up only a small amount of the GAA. And when they retire they stop getting checks so I don't think most retired IC player of 10 years will be pushing for professioalism for the next generation.
   

I know it's the worst possible scenario but we have to protect ourselves against that - the idea that "it'll never happen" will be useless if it does happen.

It can only happen if we as an organisation vote for it to happen and if we do that, then that is the democratic wish of our organisation. And still no-one has put down how professionalism can possibly be forced upon the GAA without being voted upon by the majority. Unless some-one can do that, then all you are doing is engaging in the worst form of debating tactic - unfounded scarmongering.

[lecale4]

I agree with my fellow Countyman RedBlack and others pro the grants for the following reasons:
1. The genie is out of the bottle regarding payments and we can't turn the clock back. I know of a Connaght county manager 4-6 yrs ago who was on €70,000, an Ulster county trainer who was on £30,000 3-4 yrs ago, a Down Jnr club mgr who gets £250.00/week. Where were the meetings in the Elk and the massive outcry over the last 10yrs? Its easy to attack the players - but not the older influential ex-AI winners/admin men/businessmen etc. Rules will always be bent in the pursuit of success
2. I know an Irish League player - top 4 team. He trains twice a week, plays on a Sat. He can eat and drink what he likes. Our countymen get dropped from the squad if they are seen in the pub. For 6-8 months othe year they are on eating plans, weights etc etc. They train as hard as professional palyers in England - yet they aren't shown enough appreciation in my view.
3. Rugby has had a problem with professionalism regarding the effect on clubs. But i's not a fair analogy. Gaelic games are rooted in the parish clubs, there aren't generally transfers, they aren't going to be na influx of French/English/Argentinian players. Gaelic games will survive.
4. They waved a tenner about in theElk - " grant is the same as pay for play". What about University bursaries then? I presume Conway and his mates will be calling for them to be scrapped too - or maybe they is a get out clause here?
5. Some posters tell the GAA to restrict County training nights so that players aren't burnt out etc. Get real it won't happen!

Look after the players - I don't go to watch the man who cuts the grass, wash the kit (which I do), sell ballots or write referees reports