Cork and Limerick set for return to the top division

To nobody’s great surprise, the Allianz Hurling League looks likely to be restructured for next year, with Cork and Limerick in line to be reinstated to an eight-team top division.

The proposal to do away with the six-team league that caused such consternation in the spring will be voted upon by the GAA’s Central Council at their next meeting on Saturday week, October 12th.

The move constitutes a U-turn on the issue, since central council had already decided that the format of two six-team divisions would continue – albeit with the addition of a quarter-final stage incorporating the top-four teams in Division 1B.

The latest proposal would mean the top three teams from Division 1A go into the semi-finals along with the team that finishes top of the six-team Division 1B.

New proposals
The bottom team in Division 1A would be relegated automatically under the new proposals, after which the team that finishes second in Division 1B would face the seventh-placed team in Division 1A in a promotion/relegation play-off. If the proposal is accepted, central council will be asked to approve the new structure for a five-year period.

“Meetings were recently held with county officers to consider progress on the implementation of the National Hurling Development Plan,” said the GAA in a statement yesterday. “Among the matters discussed was the structure of the Allianz Hurling League for 2014. Following that discussion, the management committee of the GAA has decided that central council should be given the opportunity to consider an alternative format for 2014.”

The move was well flagged in the wake of this year's league which saw Cork relegated to Division 1B for next season, where they were due to meet Limerick who would be spending their fourth successive year outside the top flight. It meant that the 2014 league would have a top division that contained neither the Munster champions nor the beaten All-Ireland finalists.

Blind luck
While the six-team Division 1A had provided plenty of excitement – with most teams in with a shout of making one or other of the semi-finals or the relegation play-offs on the last day – it did turn the league into a sprint to the line in which blind luck had too much of a hand in any county's fate.

Limerick had previously lost out badly when it came to structural changes, having finished top of Division Two in 2011 but being robbed of promotion by the change to a six-team league. If this proposal is carried they will see the flipside of that coin, moving up to Division 1A despite having lost the Division 1B final to Dublin in April.

County board meeting
"We're happy that there is a proposal there," Limerick county chairman Oliver Mann told The Irish Times. "We were at the meeting and we said our piece, as did other counties. We'll have a county board meeting next week and I would be surprised if we weren't instructing our delegate to support it.

“I hope it gets support at central council. I know that there will be other counties who maybe have different views on it but I just hope that it gets carried through. This is not over the line yet by any manner of means. But it’s great that there is a proposal there and I am hopeful that it will happen.”