What is very worrying is that on a GAA forum not one person has batted an eyelid at the two massive deals given to the GPA this year. It seems to me that most don't care that we are rapidly heading for some sort of pay for play & that everything in GAA now revolves around the Inter County set up & everybody is happy with that, whilst clubs are forgotten about. Today the Government gave the GPA €6.9 Million over the next three years & earlier in the year the GAA under the leadership of Padraic Duffy & Aoghain O Fearghail gave the GPA €6.2 Million & in their deal for the first time ever the GPA will now automatically get €2.5 Million or 15 per cent, whichever is greater, of all the GAA's commercial revenue. That is over €13 Million given to the GPA over the next three years independent of what they generate themselves. So approx 1600 Elite GAA members & the GPA benefit from this €13 Million while most clubs up & down the country are struggling to fund registration & affiliation fees to the GAA. Allied to that clubs are suffering from huge dropout rates from minor level to senior level, struggling financially, fixture masterplan's that are works of fiction, players, parents & managers having no idea when they will play again from Summer onwards which disrupts family life, social life, work etc & yet the GAA hierarchy just continue to pay lip service to clubs. We hear the usual statements of how the club is the grassroots of the Association, we will put clubs at the top of the agenda etc, all hollow words. I have no doubts that pay for play will be with us in some format very soon & the GAA hierarchy have no problem with that. We have seen this year also the TV rights deal signed by the GAA & how long before players will say that unless they get a share they will strike for a scheduled screened game. Anyone who wants to search for statements by Mr O Neill, Farrell, Potts, Cusack over the years will see that pay for play is the intention. Clubs & club players are now a totally different group in the Association & if the reaction to the CPA (Club Players Association) by the GAA is anything to go by, things are only going to get worse.

Uimhir.a.3. (Galway) - Posts: 409 - 15/12/2016 00:25:34    1940223

Uimhir.a.3.- I agree with you and add that the Government money should be directed to the clubs around the country not an elite few- the money given to the county players has not improved the standard of play from a spectator point of view. One of the reasons that a lot of poster have no interest may be because that most of them have little interest in a club and probably don't even support their own clubs. The way county teams are managed now requires players to:
(a) be at college or,
(b) have a part-time job.
There is now little place on a county team for a guy with a trade as he could not fulfil the 6 day/week training sessions

browncows (Meath) - Posts: 2342 - 15/12/2016 10:24:33    1940253

The game will be professional within the next 10 years but there will be less teams and it won't be split by counties but rather ten amalgamated regions/counties.

The will need to "thin the flock" as there would be too many subpar intercounty footballers that wouldn't warrant professional contracts as things stand. Once they join up counties there will be a smaller group of elite players who deserve payment. The likes of aidan O'shea and dermot connolly deserve 6 figure or high 5 figure contracts as they bring in huge revenue to the association. The likes of wicklow's corner backs (as a pure example) or cork's no 27 or 28 do not. The system may go as far as a draft and transfer system or they may all just be centrally contracted and hence not allowed to move out of their own region willy nilly.

The alternative if we keep with the intercounty system is that interest will die in all but the top 6 counties as all but those 6 or so counties will just be making up the numbers. We are already seeing this happening by the dropping attendances for provincial games.

realman2 (Kildare) - Posts: 464 - 15/12/2016 11:29:24    1940268

gotmilk (Fermanagh) - Posts: 4971 - 18/12/2016 16:26:16    1940818

With that kind of money being handed out, donated it is immoral, look at the amount of people struggling and yet the Govt gives that kind of money away to lets face it a subjective select few. Who decides who is an elite player? Is it a panellist or do you actually have to have match time to qualify? Is it gender fair? Is the process transparent? What are the strings if any attached to this? It beggars belief

arock (Dublin) - Posts: 4896 - 18/12/2016 19:52:59    1940846

carlow56 (Carlow) - Posts: 3 - 18/12/2016 23:46:17    1940886