GAA still pulling in numbers

Television coverage: Ten years ago when the idea of live coverage of championship matches was viewed with some suspicion, Peter Quinn was entering the final few months of his GAA presidency.

In an interview shortly before leaving office and with one eye on the gathering hype storm of the 1994 World Cup, he accepted that Gaelic games would always have difficulty competing with the major international sports events.

Nonetheless, figures obtained from RTÉ show that despite what was a very busy international sports year, Gaelic games more than held their own in the battle for ratings.

"I don't think they struggle with international events," says RTÉ Head of Television Sport Niall Cogley. "Every year there's a story about falling attendances but there are always two or three gems in June, maybe even one in May.

"Some of the qualifiers in June can be a bit iffy and every other year there's a World Cup or European championship up against them but they're very strong in July. Our GAA ratings are up year on year, not dramatically but up."

The front runner from last year's championship was the Tyrone-Armagh All-Ireland football final, which not alone topped the GAA ratings but came in second in the overall sports list, beaten by only the exceptional, once-off audience for the opening ceremony of the Special Olympics.

Football and hurling are equally represented within the GAA top 10 with five matches each, although the aggregate hurling audience is slightly bigger than the football.

Football is generally the more popular of the sports but last year there was a very strong showing by the Kilkenny-Tipperary All-Ireland semi-final, which came in a very clear third, 170,000 viewers clear of the figures for the football semi-finals.

Three of the top four events in RTÉ's overall top ten sports events are GAA championship matches.

In fact setting aside the Special Olympics opening ceremony, which tops the list, Gaelic games provide the three most-watched sporting contests of 2003.

So overall Croke Park will feel pleased with its games' pulling power especially as the championship has regularly to overcome not just the challenge of major soccer tournaments and other big events but also the natural counter attractions of that time of year.

Niall Cogley makes the point.

"Gaelic games has to pride itself on the performance against people's summer holidays and people who can't give up an entire sunny, summer afternoon to watch matches."

Aside from the Special Olympics there was plenty of onfield competition for football and hurling in the year just gone.

Although the national soccer team is in a state of uncertainty, there were still major qualifying matches in which Ireland had an interest until the end, one of which, the June fixture against Georgia, was the fifth-most-watched programme of the year.

Conversely the rugby team had one of its better years in the Six Nations championship and the Grand Slam decider in Dublin last March attracted the sixth-largest television audience for a sports programme.

It was also a World Cup year but the time difference between here and Australia meant - despite favourable weekend scheduling - the matches don't feature in the top ten. Australia-Ireland, with 342,000, was the highest-rated of the matches.

The European Cup rugby also featured a strong showing by Irish provinces, both Munster and Leinster reaching the semi-finals even if none of the fixtures managed to make the top 10.

Although there may be a future in which subscription channels monopolise live sports events, at present the action in Ireland is overwhelmingly terrestrial. The year ahead, featuring Euro 2004 and the Athens Olympics, will be RTÉ's busiest with 1,100 hours of sport due to be broadcast.

In such an environment sports need to be adaptable. In the years since the GAA insisted on allowing only deferred broadcast of some matches the association has developed a far more flexible approach to television scheduling. Last summer for the first time, a championship (qualifier) fixture, Offaly-Limerick, was played on a weekday evening.

Despite the difficulties involved in presenting what is effectively a once-off event, Cogley says the ratings "performed strongly".

But there is a limit to the flexibility on offer and a recent report by the GAA's Fixtures Work Group recommended no broadcast of matches on Saturday evenings because of the impact on club matches.

Over the past three seasons that Saturday evening slot had become a very successful part of the summer scheduling and this is borne out by the fact that the most watched match outside of the All-Ireland semi-finals and finals was a football qualifier played on a Saturday evening.

Roscommon's extra-time defeat of Kildare was watched by 374,000 viewers and makes the GAA list at sixth, outranking the Cork-Wexford All-Ireland hurling semi-final. Saturday matches, extending into the early evening, prime-time period tally with RTÉ's belief that prime time offers big benefits to major events.

"We're trying to encourage federations with a decent event to put it on at prime time because they'll get the audience," says Cogley.

"If you put a programme in the prime-time area two dynamics take place. Firstly the competition is stiffer on other channels. Even within RTÉ we try and complement our other channel.

"All these things are considerations. But if the programme is strong enough to get over the 'notice' threshold it has access to a good audience."

The point is made by the presence of three midweek soccer matches in the overall top 10. The Republic of Ireland's Euro qualifier with Switzerland is in seventh place, followed by Celtic-Porto in the UEFA Cup final and last autumn's Rangers-Manchester United Champions League fixture.

Gaelic games might be competing well with international competition but discretion can be the better part of valour when it comes to direct clashes.

And gone for the most part are the days when matches might be scheduled in direct opposition to soccer tournament matches involving Ireland, a change of approach thoroughly endorsed by RTÉ.

"We would always recommend," says Cogley, "that sports take into account events outside our influence and where possible accommodate them within the schedules. We also say to sports that if there's any way they can avoid each other, to do so."

"The Irish Derby has bumped into the Munster hurling final for the past few years but the racing authorities have just agreed to run the Derby at half-time in the Munster final to maximise the audience."

Although pleased with the steadily growing audiences for Gaelic games, he can identify room for improvement. "If you look at it in terms of selling a product, like a pair of socks, and ask where is there room for improvement, you'd say Dublin."

This spotlight on the capital is maybe unfair in that alone of counties it is a stand-alone demographic but it tallies with the challenge that faces the GAA at large as it deals with the competition from other sports in Dublin.