GAA Congress gets its chance to halt the runaway train of intercounty costs
In his inaugural address as GAA president, Jarlath Burns pledged to do his “utmost to stop the runaway train that is the preparation of county teams”.Similar vows had been made before. But nobody ever stopped the train. Famously, former association president Peter Quinn once quipped that when the GAA tried to expose under-the-table payments to managers, they couldn’t even find the tables.The underground nod-and-wink economy has continued to flourish. The numbers keep climbing as everybody tries to keep up with the Joneses.Because if the mob over the road appointed a feng shui dressingroom consultant and subsequently had a modicum of success, then it’s time we contacted the international guild of feng shui to hire ourselves one of those lads. Or better still, just offer the neighbours’ feng shui consultant more moolah to hop across to our side of the fence.READ MORELate Dublin threat does little to alarm Kerry in lacklustre Croke Park meetingRoscommon roar home to pip Galway in Salthill thriller Derry pulverise Offaly to run out 23-point winners at Celtic ParkLimerick show no mercy in putting 14-man Tipperary to the sword in ThurlesAnd so the train steams onwards. For 2025, the overall expenditure on preparing intercounty teams reached €45.6 million. Costs have risen over 100 per cent in the last decade.Tipperary were the highest spenders last year, coming in at €2.483 million. A total of six counties broke through the €2 million threshold – Galway, Cork, Limerick, Kerry and Donegal joining Tipp in the big-spenders bracket.But a ticket inspector might now actually be about to hop aboard the intercounty locomotive.At Congress next weekend, a motion will go before delegates to introduce an Inter-County Certification Programme, a GAA-tailored version of Uefa’s club licensing model.The concept of a high-performance licence system has been formulated by the Amateur Status Review Committee (ASRC), chaired by David Hassan.David Hassan, chair of the Amateur Status Review Committee. File photograph: Laszlo Geczo/Inpho If introduced, all counties would need to obtain a licence (certification) annually to be eligible to play in the national leagues and championships.The aim is to establish a regulatory framework around conditions of entry to ensure all counties comply to standards of player welfare and adherence to the GAA’s amateur status.“There might be views that the horse has sort of bolted but the view of the committee is very much that if we’ve got proper structures in place, that there’s still a substantial body of work that can be done here,” says Hassan.“We would like to see the association introduce a framework by which the GAA can meaningfully exercise some degree of restriction around the more excessive elements, particularly spending, that many people believe threatens the amateur status.”The ultimate requirements of the certification programme would be determined annually by a proposed new Certification, Governance and Oversight Committee (CGOC).However, among the suggestions in the ASRC’s extensive report is an attempt to bring transparency to team costs by introducing a spending cap, limiting management teams (manager/assistant manager/selectors) to four, paid backroom personnel (physios/doctors) to 10 and restricting squads to 36 players.They also want to ensure return-to-training dates are respected, establish a qualification condition for intercounty managers and introduce a requirement on teams to share GPS tracker figures and player-injury information to a centralised database.“Speaking to counties, their main concerns really are around the levels of spending, the sort of excessiveness around the intercounty scene generally,” adds Hassan.Limerick hurling manager John Kiely (second from right), coach Paul Kinnerk, players and backroom members watch the penalty shootout in last year's Munster Senior Hurling Championship final at the Galeic Grounds, Limerick. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho “The view was very much that this was getting a little bit out of control. Also, it is to do with where people perceive the power lies within the county.“Again, the opinion of many people [is] that it’s the intercounty manager that really dictates the terms and the county board becomes little more than a sort of funding arm of the intercounty team.“Whenever you have 70-80 percent or more of the turnover of the county board being spent on preparing the county teams, then obviously you just simply have less money to do the other things that arguably a county board should be doing.“It gets to a point where you have a form of a sporting arms race where the view is that if you just keep spending more money, chasing the dream almost, that one day the ship will come in.“And that’s fine to some extent, but if you don’t exercise some degree of caution around that approach, then it really does threaten the sustainability of a county over the longer term.”So, how would it work?To enter competitions, on an annual basis counties would need to obtain a licence (certification) by satisfying a minimum set of standards.The criteria would be set by the CGOC, who would also establish sanctions for breaches. The intention would be to have two key phases: Pre-season and In-Season.Pre-SeasonCounties would need to have appointed senior managers who have completed a new intercounty managerial induction course and ensure backroom-team members have qualifications appropriate to their role. The county’s end-of-year financial statements would need to be in order and they must have adhered to the Annual Maximum Expenditure Limits (AMEL) in the previous 12 months.In-SeasonCounties must respect return-to-training and closed-season dates, adhere to anti-doping requirements and comply with an agreed streamlined backroom team. They would also have to submit panel registration of 36 players (or whatever number is ultimately determined) prior to the start of the league and again before the championship.Clare manager Brian Lohan speaks to his backroom team in the final minutes of the 2024 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final at Croke Park. Photograph: Morgan Treacy/Inpho What might the penalties be?The sanctions for breaches have yet to be decided, but one working model involves an accumulative penalty-points system whereby a set number of points would be incurred by a county for each breach. The points would accumulate towards a maximum limit. If the limit is exceeded, it could ultimately lead to the withdrawal of certification for a county. Other possibilities include the potential loss of home advantage or financial penalties.And there will be a cap on spending?Yes, it is being termed as an Annual Maximum Expenditure Limit (AMEL). It is suggested that by October 30th annually, each county would submit its proposed compliant expenditure for the following year’s intercounty competitions.Why the fuss about wanting teams to share GPS and injury data?These are both seen as important player-welfare issues but counties have traditionally been reluctant to share the relevant information. The Football Review Committee last year asked counties to provide GPS data to help them understand the demands of the new rules, but they achieved only a sample size of four teams.The ASRC are proposing that all counties would use GAA-supplied and approved GPS trackers from a single-source supplier. On the issue of understanding injuries in Gaelic Games, shared data could aid studies in injury prevention. Agreeing to contribute to an anonymised GPS and injury data-sharing hub would be among the metrics.What does a senior intercounty managerial induction programme look like?The starting point seems to be an ambition to create a framework around the unregulated recruitment of managers. It is not envisaged that managers would, at least initially, need to go through a rigorous vetting process.The ASRC’s report explains: “An annual obligatory induction meeting or short course for intercounty managers – based around information sharing and best practice in the area of player welfare and sports science – would represent a suitable starting point.”Gaelic Players Association CEO Tom Parsons believes it would be a positive stipulation.“It’s amazing, you need all your coaching badges to coach at underage but anybody can just be parachuted into a [senior county] management role,” he said.“So, a part of the licensing committee is to probably work out KPIs (key performance indicators) and expectations on someone coming in as an intercounty manager.”Armagh football manager Kieran McGeeney has signalled his opposition to the proposed changes. Photograph: Ryan Byrne/Inpho And everybody is delighted with this plan?Not quite. Some intercounty managers have expressed frustration. Speaking last Sunday, Armagh manager Kieran McGeeney said: “That’s why they’re doing this – to tell us not to have big backroom teams.“You know my feeling, it’s Big Brother.”McGeeney added: “If they’re looking for licences, I think they could maybe look a wee bit closer to the county boards and for the people in those positions.”If passed at Congress, when would it become operational?Next year. Ultimately, Congress delegates next weekend will decide if the Inter-County Certification Programme is to be introduced. For many casual GAA observers, it might appear overly fussy, but Hassan feels the stakes are high.“If the association moves to a semi-professional model – and the danger is we’re not very far away from that – if truth be told, then there is no going back.“There’s no denying that the symptoms of a creeping form of semi-professionalism are there for all of us to see.“Therefore, the question is quite simply whether or not we want to maintain the amateur status of the GAA or are we prepared simply to allow it erode on almost a month-by-month, year-by-year basis to reach a point when people will say, ‘well, it never used to be like this’.“And then, arguably, it’s too late. So, it’s quite a quite a major prize to be had.”
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