GAA's conservatism has a royal tinge

SIDELINE CUT: The GAA probably won't be thrilled to acknowledge this but they share many traits with the English monarchy. This is an important week for both institutions. Yesterday, the royal family bade adieu to an ancient, beloved and sometimes controversial old relic and at the weekend, the GAA hierarchy will consider doing the same.

You have to hand it to the British royals. They really know how to deliver an impressive send-off. Since the Queen Mother's peaceful demise last week, even green-hued curmudgeons on this side of the water have been saying kind things of her, based principally on her capacity for downing G&Ts, her love for equine sport and her staggering longevity. And it does take a certain calibre of lady to reportedly earn the title of "the most dangerous woman in Europe" from no less than Adolf Hitler.

Sad to admit, but here we became rather transfixed by the pageantry involved in the laying-to-rest of the Queen Mum. We were fascinated by the way that after a decade of royal bashing, half of England still turned out for the lying in state and the "last journey" to Westminster Abbey.

We were forced to admire the way that the royals, without doing anything other than burying their grandmother, had their subjects fawning over them once again. We were astonished to discover that there are enough British royals with which to successfully people a medium-sized housing estate. Did you know there is a Lord Ulster? (is he Lord of our bits of Ulster?).

But overall we found ourselves appreciating, vaguely, the allure of the monarchy and why the English people embrace them on State occasions such as yesterday, when their deep and unyielding self-importance actually imposed a mood of gravity and proud reflection on people with phone bills and gin addictions and grandmothers who will die unnoticed. On days of state, when the throne flexes muscle, the anarchists' cries for an end to monarchy are drowned out by floodtides of support.

THIS weekend is the annual gathering of the GAA clan for Congress, an occasion that is not unlike yesterday's pageant in London. Okay, so the white shirts may not be quite so crisp and there won't be nearly so many Grenadier Guards. But as well as being an important weekend for the association, Congress is a renewal of acquaintances, a time to swap good stories, to exchange viewpoints and reminisce about departed colleagues.

Some delegates are fastidiously temperate in the matter of booze; others will put away Mumsian quantities of tipple. You will see the GAA's past at Congress in the elderly delegates, suited, hardy, zestful for life, lovers of a good day out. You will see the future in the young delegate, conservative, bright-looking, with, as Michael McLaverty's immortal line goes, "an array of coloured pencils in his breast pocket" .

Congress helps the outsider to understand what the GAA, an ethereal concept at the best of times, really is. While the GAA is fundamentally about games, it also has nothing to do with games. Players often refer to the administrative GAA as "they". The GAA is about the gleaming edifice on the Jones's Road, but on another level it has nothing to do with Croke Park.

The GAA is Seán McCague and the man who sells the club lotto at the weekends. It is premium tickets and the coveted pink pass that entitles holders to mugs of tea and endless sandwiches on winter Sundays in Mullingar. The GAA is about tie-pins, hundreds and hundreds of them. The GAA is about the lunacy of stopping a guy like Alan Kerins from devoting himself, free gratis, to hurling and football. The GAA is about not having to defend or explain such decisions. The GAA is all about contradictions.

The GAA is chiefly a mindset and the abiding principle of that mindset is: All In Good Time. So when it comes to the lying-in-state of Rule 42 weekend, the delegates will be impervious to the pleas for enlightenment and progression and what not and they will vote to keep their beloved relic on life support.

In this space, we couldn't care less if Croke Park is opened to international soccer, rugby, dwarf-throwing and naked sky diving (all in the one afternoon, with Red Hurley at half-time). But we have to shake our heads and smile at the way the GAA will use its hand this weekend.

It is not up to Congress to save the nation from Bertie's sporting Versailles. That is - or will become - a matter for the electorate. It is not up to Congress to make room in the bed for the homeless FAI. It is not up to Congress to make amends for last year's Government-induced scheming, pitiful and small-minded as it was. The only duty of Congress is to vote as it sees fit to preserve and enhance the interests of the association.

Like the monarchy, the more mud you fire at the GAA the more serene in self-belief they become. They are masterfully calm in the face of popular outcry. Enjoyable as Jack Boothman's apocalyptic missive has been for sceptics, he was simply voicing a mainstream GAA view. Yes, soccer is the devil. And since when has the GAA preached liberalism?

The miracle of the GAA is that it works so well despite itself. Paranoia, self-doubt, trenchant conservatism, fear of outside sports and veneration of the past are all key parts of the GAA psyche. In order to love the GAA, you have to swallow these faults whole.

The GAA may not even vote on Rule 42 this weekend. Failure to do so will provoke another round of GAA-bashing and the leaders will blink impassively at the oaths and remonstrations until everyone is blue in the face. Then they will go to the match on Sunday.

And in the future, when circumstance renders it financially irresistible or when the mood within has changed, they will announce that Rule 42 passed away in its sleep. Peacefully. And then they will sit back and accept our praise. All in their own good and heedless time.