http://m.independent.ie/sport/gaelic-games/gaa-unrest-revealed-ive-considered-driving-the-car-into-a-ditch-rather-than-train-in-the-winter-muck-34254856.html

Is it gone too far?
I no I wouldnt be able for the commitment.

Joe_Bloggs (Tipperary) - Posts: 186 - 04/12/2015 10:12:00    1811360

Crazy stuff altogether.

keeper7 (Longford) - Posts: 4088 - 04/12/2015 10:28:11    1811364

This is the key bit:

However, managers must also shoulder a lot of blame for calling sessions in sleet, fog and snow, to gain a perceived edge on possible opponents. All the while their players are pushed to breaking point.

When one manager achieves success by giving the players the winter off and then putting in place a plan to win from that point, things will reverse. It can be done - Tyrone 2005 for example, 2 training sessions a week and players getting their own gym program.

to be honest I don't know why anyone outside of Kilkenny would realistically want to be a county hurler. The rewards are fairly poor and it is no co-incidence that players are retiring younger and younger. At least in football there are 3-4 counties who can win the big one which means another 7-8 counties will try to compete to get to the 1/4 finals.

A sad situation.

slayer (Limerick) - Posts: 6480 - 04/12/2015 11:17:08    1811377

slayer
County: Limerick
Posts: 5827

to be honest I don't know why anyone outside of Kilkenny would realistically want to be a county hurler. The rewards are fairly poor and it is no co-incidence that players are retiring younger and younger. At least in football there are 3-4 counties who can win the big one which means another 7-8 counties will try to compete to get to the 1/4 finals.

A sad situation.

My uncle said to me about 15 years ago that they should scrap the county teams and have a really good club championship. At the time I laughed at him but I can see his point now.
It must be fair tough for teams who havnt a snow balls chance in hell of winning anything, going training at this time of the year.

Joe_Bloggs (Tipperary) - Posts: 186 - 04/12/2015 12:01:35    1811391

What I don't understand is we have these ridiculous training regimes where paranoid managers wont want to give any advantage to rivals at all but come summer we're still served muck by lots of teams and hammerings get handed out.
How can so much training and preparation lead to such bad football?

RoyalBadger (Meath) - Posts: 571 - 04/12/2015 12:25:52    1811398

Why do the players put up with it.The choose to do all this training they ar enot tied to any contracts.

If players just tell ther manager they are not doing that level of training then the manager has no choice but to do what his players want or go.

If it's a case that there are not enough players that are unhappy with the demands being place on them in order to force change then there is no real issue.

uibhfhaili1986 (Offaly) - Posts: 1296 - 04/12/2015 12:36:03    1811401

04/12/2015 12:36:03
uibhfhaili1986
Why do the players put up with it.The choose to do all this training they ar enot tied to any contracts.
If players just tell ther manager they are not doing that level of training then the manager has no choice but to do what his players want or go.
If it's a case that there are not enough players that are unhappy with the demands being place on them in order to force change then there is no real issue. The players choose to do it as they don't want to drop off the squad. The coaching teams have all the power. There isn't any contracts in one sense but the players cant just tell a coach they wont do the training as they will be removed from squad and others will go in their place.

ormondbannerman (Clare) - Posts: 13473 - 04/12/2015 12:53:10    1811405

uibhfhaili1986
County: Offaly
Posts: 724

1811401
Why do the players put up with it.The choose to do all this training they ar enot tied to any contracts.

If players just tell ther manager they are not doing that level of training then the manager has no choice but to do what his players want or go.


If it's a case that there are not enough players that are unhappy with the demands being place on them in order to force change then there is no real issue.

I believe that would be followed with a that's no problem Jimmy but don't let the door hit out on the way out.

Anyway i don't see what the problem is. I am yet to meet an intercounty player who hates it all. I know one or two and they enjoy the training and games. They admit that it's tough but they still enjoy it.

gotmilk (Fermanagh) - Posts: 4971 - 04/12/2015 13:11:04    1811413

I not so sure the shift from county to club has not already begun. Players are not going to engage a county scene that requires an almost professional approach, especially where, realistically, there are only hand full of real contenders. Why put your life on hold for 10 years for nothing. The club scene offers a more realistic chance of success and a normal lifestyle that you associate with an amateur. I remember there was a Carlow club (was it Eire og) that won a few Leinster club titles back in the day, they never had a chance of winning a Leinster medal at County level. The country is full of good, well run clubs that are becoming more and more insular with regard to protecting young players (neighbours children)
The powers that be would need to wake up soon.

mhunicean_abu (Monaghan) - Posts: 1044 - 04/12/2015 14:17:08    1811429

Playing at county level is professional in all but name only. When you have a professional S+C coach like Mike McGurn saying the players train way too much for the games played people should sit up and listen. The issue comes because some teams which have had regimented schedules, Clare under Loughnane, Armagh and Tyrone to a lesser degree, Dublin under Pillar and Donegal under McGuiness, a lot was made of the brutal training these teams undertook and unfortunately other teams begin to copy, whilst completely ignoring the fact these teams had very good players with astute coaches. You could argue the brutal nature of he training was to foster a team spirit rather than improve the playing skills of the players as they already had a fair smattering of them, therefore teams less laden with these skills are just persecuting players by subjecting them to ridiculous levels of training like this.

You could stick 15 triathletes in O Neills jerseys and they wouldn't make a good team so why the need to train morning, noon and night is beyond me, it flies in the face of the professionalism they are supposedly striving for because the risk of injury increases exponentially as a function of the training they are doing. Look at the Ireland and Wales rugby teams, some of the best funded, well looked after professionals in their field, and by the WC Qtr finals it was like watching the walking wounded and these are guys who don't have to get up for work or studies in the morning, these injury crises can strike anyone and we've seen the preponderance of cruciates going in early spring on the rise over the last few years.

It is supposed to be an amateur organisation and we want to see the best players performing to the best of their abilities where possible, beasting them as described in the article does no one any favours and it spells disaster because the professional standards being applied will only be sustainable in a few counties and those left behind could wither on the vine leading to an even less competitive championship in both codes.

duckula20 (Antrim) - Posts: 175 - 04/12/2015 15:07:18    1811445

I've said it before, but I much prefer to watch club football and hurling. I vote with my feet and don't attend intercounty games for the most part nowadays. Even now I'm watching far more club games on tv on TG4 than I would watch county games in summer. Fitness, fitness, fitness. The players are bigger, stronger, faster than ever and yet I love the club game because a skill player can get a wee bit more space. Much better to watch in my opinion. The guys playing intercounty, I don't think I'd do it nowadays. Training 5 nights a week for a team who will not get far, while driving two hours to training from Dublin and two hours home with work the next morning, its crazy. It's actually not good sport science to ask a guy to drive for 4 hours to do a 90 min training session, totally counterproductive. Let them at it. The counties with money have many players who are semi-pro at this stage and have pushed the bar too high for most counties to ever be able to compete. It's sad.

icehonesty (Wexford) - Posts: 2550 - 04/12/2015 18:24:34    1811471

It is like an arms race, once someone perceives the opposition has an edge they replicate and so on. The problem is they all think this is a race to the top when it is in spectacle terms a race to the bottom.

arock (Dublin) - Posts: 4895 - 04/12/2015 19:44:09    1811483

ormondbannerman
County: Clare
Posts: 10628

The players choose to do it as they don't want to drop off the squad. The coaching teams have all the power. There isn't any contracts in one sense but the players cant just tell a coach they wont do the training as they will be removed from squad and others will go in their place.

As you said the players choose to do it.

They don't have to do it to feed their family.It's a personal choice and although I think the demands on players are too high they won't decrease until players want them to.If the players don't want to do so much training they can choose not to be part of the panel and maybe when we have inter county panels filled with nothing but players who have commitment but no skill then things might change.As long as the best footballers and hurlers are willing to commit things won't change.

uibhfhaili1986 (Offaly) - Posts: 1296 - 04/12/2015 20:08:46    1811490

I was out with a Dublin player last week ,who happened to start in the All Ireland final against Kerry ,I mentioned Brollys article on team bonding and how having a few pints after a game in his day was good for moral and that Brolly lamented that it was dying in the game now.
He laughed and said Gavin was big into players going out together. After every league and championship game the lads go on the beer. The attitude is , They train hard ,eat well and arent children .a few pints after a game will do no harm to the body as regards recovery,but allows lads release a bit of steam. Bottom line with Gavin is once you produce the goods , you play.

AthCliath (Dublin) - Posts: 4347 - 04/12/2015 20:24:44    1811491

The players would be far better off if they had a certain amount of training but more actual games.
Constant training is not what they want its better organised and regular competitions.
No need for all the flogging of guys into the ground.

Dubh_linn (Dublin) - Posts: 2312 - 04/12/2015 20:50:13    1811495

I think the problem is that there are games straight away after Christmas, it is stupid that we have O'Byrne cup matches 1st week in Jan.

For me, there shouldn't be a ball kicked or pucked until 1st March, this gives 2 months to allow for pre-season training and realistically players should be aiming to be flying in June rather than March. Then compress the inter county season, have the final played by the middle of August and then let the clubs have the rest of the year. November and December = closed shop, no training or matches.

Having played myself at club level, I looked forward to going back training after Christmas.

I guess a massive problem is that it is in managers interest to have teams training at this stage of the year. Don't tell me managers aren't getting their mileage, that would be deluded talk.

I cant believe that managers think this is the way forward, because all it is the way forward to is shortened inter county careers and players deciding that the level of effort isn't worth it. It is supposed to be a hobby, a pasttime. Where did we lose sight of this fact?

Pinkie (Wexford) - Posts: 4100 - 04/12/2015 20:54:27    1811496

ormondbannerman
The players choose to do it as they don't want to drop off the squad. The coaching teams have all the power. There isn't any contracts in one sense but the players cant just tell a coach they wont do the training as they will be removed from squad and others will go in their place.
04/12/2015 20:08:46 uibhfhaili1986
As you said the players choose to do it.
They don't have to do it to feed their family.It's a personal choice and although I think the demands on players are too high they won't decrease until players want them to.If the players don't want to do so much training they can choose not to be part of the panel and maybe when we have inter county panels filled with nothing but players who have commitment but no skill then things might change.As long as the best footballers and hurlers are willing to commit things won't change. The players do choose to do It but at same time they are influenced by what others do and management teams have too much power in one extent. Demands are too high but while players have to want change regulation must be brought in to give players a better chance/

ormondbannerman (Clare) - Posts: 13473 - 04/12/2015 21:10:16    1811501

It is crazy,but what do counties do that have not got the finances to compete with the likes of Dublin?

ziggy32001 (Meath) - Posts: 8354 - 05/12/2015 09:29:19    1811520

I think the problem is that there are games straight away after Christmas, it is stupid that we have O'Byrne cup matches 1st week in Jan. For me, there shouldn't be a ball kicked or pucked until 1st March, this gives 2 months to allow for pre-season training and realistically players should be aiming to be flying in June rather than March. Then compress the inter county season, have the final played by the middle of August and then let the clubs have the rest of the year. November and December = closed shop, no training or matches. Having played myself at club level, I looked forward to going back training after Christmas. I guess a massive problem is that it is in managers interest to have teams training at this stage of the year. Don't tell me managers aren't getting their mileage, that would be deluded talk. I cant believe that managers think this is the way forward, because all it is the way forward to is shortened inter county careers and players deciding that the level of effort isn't worth it. It is supposed to be a hobby, a pasttime. Where did we lose sight of this fact?

Pinkie (Wexford) - 04/12/2015 20:54:27

Couldn't agree much more with this. I think it'd be cool actually if both the football finals and hurling finals were both on the August bank holiday weekend. I'd say that'd be class. Some weekend for Dublin, the city would be absolutely jumping the whole time.

Starting in the first week of Match you've 22/23 weeks until the August bank holiday weekend. Loads of time to play off the county season.

Whammo86 (Antrim) - Posts: 4207 - 05/12/2015 14:52:53    1811566

ziggy32001
County: Meath
Posts: 4184

1811520
It is crazy,but what do counties do that have not got the finances to compete with the likes of Dublin?

This has nothing to do with competing with Dublin Ziggy, Clare hurling had players being treated like children by management has that anything to do with competing with Dublin.
The topic is about what is expected of the modern intercounty player . Personally i think it has a lot to do with certain Managers their egos and their concern with improving their Cvs and win at all costs.
Unfortunetly players become the pawns by some of these guys and its usually the smaller counties who suffer.

AthCliath (Dublin) - Posts: 4347 - 05/12/2015 16:24:50    1811574