Sean Moran: Hurling feast strengthens case for football reform

It was a brilliant weekend for hurling but ironically the unscheduled double bill at the weekend ended up more illuminating for football.

Two aspects of the All-Ireland hurling semi-finals are relevant here: the fact that they were played on the same weekend and that one of them was played outside of Croke Park on a Saturday evening.

There were of course other factors. Both Kilkenny-Waterford and Tipperary-Galway were exceptionally gripping matches, veering one way and then another before going down to the wire amidst tiny differentials.

That may not be the focus of this piece but it’s worth recalling, as the semi-finals haven’t been guaranteed competitive in recent times, let alone classics. Only once in the past 18 years have both All-Ireland semi-finals in the one championship been won by a single score or less.

Páraic Duffy’s reform proposal for the football championship advocates amongst other things the staging of All-Ireland semi-finals on the same weekend and bringing quarter-final matches in his suggested round-robin format to venues outside of Dublin.

The GAA director general was correct to identify the appeal of doubling up weekends. Last year the Dublin-Mayo replay and the hurling final were played on successive days in what was the biggest weekend in the games' history in terms of attendances with two full houses.

Two years ago, the football semi-finals were decided on the same weekend, one in the electric tension at Limerick’s Gaelic Grounds where Kerry beat Mayo after extra time and the second a day later when Donegal sprang a major surprise by deposing champions Dublin in Croke Park, what remains the county’s only defeat so far in four seasons of Jim Gavin’s management.

It helped that the matches were so noteworthy in themselves but the sense of anticipation in having two big events in two days plays a major part in creating excitement and promotional impact.

In the early days of the qualifiers and for a few years more recently (eg the 2013 matches played on successive days before an aggregate attendance of just over 133,000), All-Ireland quarter-finals had a similar impact when held on successive days.

On the second point, concerning venues, it was noticeable on Saturday how much more comfortably Semple Stadium can stage events with smaller attendances – taking a smaller attendance, 30,358, than at the drawn semi-final between Kilkenny and Waterford and creating a dramatic atmosphere.

There was a furore two years ago over the selection of the Gaelic Grounds for the Kerry-Mayo replay and it emphasised how rare such fixtures have become since the redevelopment of Croke Park since when headquarters tends to get virtually every All-Ireland semi-final and the only exception is when the venue isn’t available.

Controversially this was for an American football match in 2014 and last weekend because the number of matches in the World Games that took place on Friday made a third successive day – even at Croke Park – impractical.

Yet the GAA pours vast sums of money into developing provincial grounds that frequently fill to capacity just once every few years depending on the luck of the home county’s draw.

In fact when the work group (coincidentally, also chaired by Duffy) that devised the qualifier format originally reported in 2000, it proposed that provincial champions be awarded home advantage in the All-Ireland quarter-finals. That was defeated but the intention was clear: to spread the big matches around as well as reward counties for winning their province.

Thurles on Saturday showed how well significant fixtures work outside of Dublin and also what a great atmosphere is created by lights, introduced into the encroaching dusk, as autumn approaches – a point already made by the All-Ireland final replay of 2013.

It was after the first international rules test of the resumed series in Australia in 1999 when a GAA official declared vehemently that Croke Park would have to get lights. They were right about that, as has been shown on many occasions since 2007 when Dublin and Tyrone played the first floodlit fixture on Jones's Road.

Using Saturday nights for big matches as well as Sundays creates a major opportunity to create additional time for non-inter-county activity.

These points have been made in the Duffy document but the concern remains that the proposals may be subject to cherry-picking and if eight more inter-county championship matches are to be added but replays retained or the more extensive use of Saturdays resisted the whole idea will slide into chaos.

It’s also a point worth making that although the idea of a round-robin format at All-Ireland football quarter-final stage is worth a shot, hurling is arguably in even greater need of additional big matches.

Up until nine years ago the hurling championship had four quarter-finals and established a standard starting line for all eight teams aspiring to win the Liam MacCarthy Cup.

The reason for discontinuing this format was that provincial champions weren’t getting bang for their buck but was that an adequate reason to distort the championship?

Interestingly in recent years an opposing argument has begun to emerge and it suggests that far from being advantaged by the format, provincial champions are being handicapped by having to weather a five-week gap between provincial final and All-Ireland semi-final before playing a team with an additional match under their belt.

Since the change in 2007, provincial champions have lost seven out of the 16 semi-finals. More recent evidence of the past 10 days has been that neither Kilkenny nor Tipperary were as sharp after the break in their semi-finals and in the former's case the improvement in touch and timing in the replay was clear.

Last weekend may have helped to make the case for football reforms but hurling with its much reduced cast could also do with a few more big nights.

email: smoran@irishtimes.com