Strike threat to National Leagues

GAELIC GAMES: The GAA's National Leagues face abandonment should this evening's threat of a players' strike be realised.

Should sufficient numbers of county panels row in behind the suggested boycott of next weekend's concluding stages of the National Football League and Hurling League the number of team expulsions would make the play-off stages impossible to proceed with.

It was confirmed to The Irish Times by senior sources in the GAA that in the event of a counties being unable to field teams due to strike action, matches would be awarded to their opponents and that in the event of player support proving sufficiently widespread, both leagues would be abandoned.

This would clearly be an extreme outcome and would depend on players voting to boycott the matches, sufficient numbers agreeing to support that course of action and counties being unable to field teams of willing replacements.

Tonight an extraordinary general meeting of the Gaelic Players Association (GPA) will be held at two venues, one in Portlaoise and one in Belfast, and conducted over a live link, to consider an appropriate response to what the organisation considers the GAA's procrastination on the issue of proposed Government grants for intercounty footballers and hurlers.

A proposal to boycott the final weekend of regulation league matches will be debated and voted on by those in attendance as well as by other GPA members, who have been canvassed for their opinions by mobile text message.

The GPA have announced that the meeting, which starts at five o'clock, will be held in camera. A statement will be released afterwards but there won't be a press conference until Monday morning in Jury's Hotel, Croke Park.

Should the proposal succeed it will represent the most serious rupture between a players' representative body and the GAA in over 100 years of Gaelic games.

Central to the current row between the GAA and GPA is the question of a proposal by the players' body that all members of intercounty panels receive an annual Government grant of up to €2,500.

At February's Central Council meeting, GPA delegate and chief executive Dessie Farrell proposed a motion asking for support for the idea, which had been extensively discussed with both Ministers and the Irish Sports Council.

The GAA sought to defer a decision pending discussions between the incoming president Nickey Brennan and the GPA. Farrell withdrew his motion but in the aftermath of a meeting between the GPA and the Minister for Sport, John O'Donoghue, which was not attended by any GAA official despite an invitation from the GPA, the players' body called this evening's meeting to decide on their response.

The GAA has, however, declined to make an official response to the looming crisis pending developments but earlier this month when asked about the prospect of a strike by the GPA, GAA director general Liam Mulvihill replied: "That's a hypothetical situation. We'll wait and see but we're not slow to take decisions when the need arises."

Armagh manager Joe Kernan has expressed the hope that this evening's egm doesn't result in a players' strike.

"I would hope that they wouldn't take that drastic action but it is time that everyone sat down and talked about the situation.

"I'm very glad to see players being better looked after nowadays with sponsorships and public appearances but hopefully the current situation can be talked about before doing anything drastic."

Meanwhile, the GAA have announced that the contentious Donegal-Longford National Football League Division Two A fixture will be held in Ballyshannon next Tuesday at 6.15pm. Originally listed as a home match for Longford, it was called off because it would have left Donegal with only two home fixtures. It will now be completed ahead of next weekend's final round of Football League matches.