Replying To Viking66: "Sorry misread your post so. I thought you meant play the county club championships Jan til March!! I proposed playing the Provincial and AI club championships that time of year before myself."
Its makes so much sense. Combined with 4G pitches, it takes all the pressure off counties like Wexford to finish their championships in such a tight window
Replying To ExiledInWex: "Its makes so much sense. Combined with 4G pitches, it takes all the pressure off counties like Wexford to finish their championships in such a tight window"
The issue is the intercounty football season is too long.
It needs to be shortened. With the current hurling league being very developmental focused there's no issue in playing it alongside club provincial and All Ireland.
The football league being linked to the championship doesn't allow that.
There's a big issue in the calendar and in player welfare with how ungainly the football season as a whole is now.
It's just not on that a team could be playing up to 19 weekends if they won their League had to play a Provincial Preliminary round and then played all 7 All Ireland rounds.
19 potential games for 1 team when we have to facilitate good quality club championships for all players in 2 codes just doesn't work and needs to be addressed.
Club championships are the bread and butter for most players a year and for us to only really be facilitating between 3 and 6 games in each for teams in these competitions is actually very wrong.
Replying To StoreysTash: "I consumed more GAA media in the last week than I have in the past year, and the main lament was "The All-Ireland final should be in September". Which made me think, well is there an option where it can be? It can in my opinion, but it will involve inter county managers giving up their players for club action throughout the summer (don't know if a runner). I was a club player until last year, and I liked the certainty the calendar gave us. But I would have loved if it was throughout the Summer rather than at the back end of it after the best of the summer had passed. And, even the slightest niggle in it meant players missed vital matches with no healing time.
I know a few inter county players and I know they would love a break from the all consuming nature of it by getting back to their clubs at various stages in the year.
Assumptions: 1. Provincials start at the same time. 2. Club weeks every month (except August for teams still in AI Series) 3. A 2 week break before the Provincial Finals. 4. A week of a break before the resumption of inter county activity, so managers can get their team back together.
22/04/2023 Provincial Round 1 29/04/2023 Provincial Round 2 06/05/2023 Club Week 13/05/2023 Club Week 20/05/2023 Break 27/05/2023 Provincial Round 3 03/06/2023 Provincial Round 4 10/06/2023 Club Week 17/06/2023 Club Week 24/06/2023 Break 01/07/2023 Provincial Round 5 08/07/2023 Break 15/07/2023 Provincial Final 22/07/2023 Club week 29/07/2023 Club week 05/08/2023 Break 12/08/2023 AI Quarter Finals 19/08/2023 Break 26/08/2023 AI Semi Final 02/09/2023 Break 09/09/2023 AI Final 16/09/2023 Club from here on
Biggest advantage is the club game is part of the entire summer, not just for when the inter county season is over. Rather than a microwave championship as Donal Og called it its spread out but the club is a big part of the summer.
I won't be here to reply to responses until tomorrow morning GMT as I have footie training for the evening."
Great to hear you are playing a bit of Aussie Rules. It's a good game. That's a good calendar and something like it was back in the day. The problem was intercounty managements won't release the lads back to the clubs, and would be even less likely to release players to play the other code. Also 8 AI quarter finals in 1 weekend will play havoc with the TV people."
I know you wrote this ages ago but when you say that the managers won't release players back to their clubs, isn't it more of a case that the players are refusing to go back to their clubs? If they want to play for their club an intercounty manager can't stop them.
I'm not too clued in on these debates, split season, new formats etc, but it would seem to me that most of the problems lie with the players who allow their county managers to monopolise their time for months of the year while their clubs are forgotten.
I know they want an all Ireland medal but players are very quick to point out, pretty much unanimously, that club comes first. Well let them prove it.