Nobody should have been too surprised at the revelation that Sinn Fein was considering lobbying GAA clubs as part of a campaign against the new Police Service of Northern Ireland. Anyone who recalls the party's avid opposition to the 1998 special congress motion to delete Rule 21, the provision prohibiting members of the Northern security forces from joining the association, would know how important that prohibition is to republicans.
The decision to fudge the issue was taken at special congress three years ago as a result of strong opposition from Ulster counties to deleting the rule. No vote was taken on the motion for repeal. Instead it was decided the GAA would drop the rule when effective steps were taken to implement the amended structures and policing arrangements envisaged in the British-Irish peace agreement.
This was the best the GAA could do within days of the referendums that signalled massive acceptance for the Belfast Agreement. Given the deterioration of attitudes to the peace process since those optimistic days and the continuing targeting of GAA clubs by Loyalist paramilitaries, it's hard to imagine why the Ulster counties would now be any better disposed towards removing the contentious rule. And it's accepted within the GAA that they're not.
This unyielding stand on the policing issue has been of some comfort to Sinn Fein, as it has provided what could be interpreted as populist support for the party's stance on the same issue. For many years republicans have learned to live with the disapproval of the Government, the church and the SDLP.
The fact that those pillars of the nationalist consensus have opted to support the implementation plan isn't nearly as significant from Sinn Fein's perspective as would be the GAA's support for the policing package.
For a long time, the GAA's position on Rule 21 has effectively been dictated by the majority view in the six cross-Border Ulster counties. That has guaranteed a solid core of opposition to removing the ban.
The views of those six counties carry the vote at provincial council level, with Donegal, Cavan and Monaghan reluctant to oppose the verdict from those on the ground in the North.
Although Northern counties dislike the suggestion they should have sole responsibility for adjudicating the issue - that would be an obviously partitionist concept - they are happy congress delegates from the South should take strong notice of their opinions.
Willingness to do so ensures the GAA's policy on Rule 21, as opposed to policy on other issues, radiates from a relatively small number of counties. The equivocation accepted in May 1998 was seen at the time as a hostage to fortune. How would the GAA adjudicate on the effectiveness of the steps taken in relation to policing? Was it not extremely risky to set itself up as an arbiter of political progress in the North?
Those reservations are now plainly confirmed. With no straightforward nationalist consensus, the GAA is between a rock and a hard place.
Protests during the week that the association should have been given a copy of the implementation plan much earlier than last Tuesday are valid. After all, the dropping of Rule 21 was one of the recommendations contained in the Patten Report. If the GAA was as central a player as that, it should have been on the mailing list for the draft plans.
But such legitimate complaints have no bearing on the decision facing the GAA. With the All-Irelands coming up, followed by the International Rules series in Australia, the timing is awkward for accommodating the scale of the consultative process necessary to deal with the issue. It's hard to see any special congress on the issue occurring before late October.
None the less a decision must be taken unless there is a meltdown in the peace process. Last March it was accepted at the highest level of the GAA that D-Day on the issue was fast approaching. This was because recruitment for the new police service was to start in the autumn. How could the GAA block an obvious career path for large numbers of young footballers and hurlers?
The hard decision was postponed because of the political fallout from the changes made to Patten by the British government, but one danger always existed and recently became more and more threatening: the splintering of the nationalist consensus on policing. There is now the prospect of the GAA appearing to be led by the nose on the issue by Sinn Fein. Throughout the Troubles, the GAA has striven to present itself as politically neutral within the broader nationalist spectrum but of late it has become more and more difficult to maintain that neutrality.
Already this year the Westminster elections in June emphasised the growing influence of Sinn Fein within the GAA. Players were photographed supporting a Sinn Fein candidate in Tyrone despite Rule 8 of the GAA's official guide: "The association shall be nonparty political and no committee, club, council or representative thereof shall take part as such in any party political movement."
Well-known players in or out of county jerseys may argue that as individuals they have the right to do what they want in their spare time, and in that context Rule 8 is probably unsustainable, but the political value of players relates to their GAA activities. Many players have entered the political arena on the back of successful playing careers, most notably Jack Lynch, but the current spectre of GAA policy on a highly sensitive matter being driven by the agenda of one party would be an alarming one for most members of the association.
As one official in an Ulster county put it in assessing Sinn Fein's influence: "They're calling a lot of shots around here. The SDLP, which on a demographic basis must represent at least about half of the GAA membership in Northern Ireland and whose most senior members oppose the retention of Rule 21, simply isn't as aggressive or vocal in its campaigning."
The one possibility of a development on the issue lies with the current GAA president, Sean McCague. A former Monaghan football manager, he has been loyal to the Ulster consensus on Rule 21 over the years and genuinely affected by the deaths of people he knew as GAA members who were murdered simply because of that association.
Mr McCague is a strong-minded individual and made his administrative name as a strict chairman of the Games Administration Committee in the early 1990s. He will have credibility with the Ulster counties but that won't stop them telling him where to get off on the issue if they don't want to move. What happens next will be crucial.
It was strenuously argued three years ago that by sitting on its hands and acting on Rule 21 only when the policing issue was resolved, the GAA would lose any chance of kudos for making a contribution. The danger now is that unless it acts soon it will become indistinguishable from Sinn Fein on the issue and an obstacle to any resolution.
Sean Moran is GAA Correspondent of The Irish Times