Change doesn't come easily to the GAA. The requirement for a two-thirds majority to introduce or delete rules is a practical discouragement. Then add in the fact that the officials and administrators who comprise an annual congress are both older and more conservative than the average membership. The status quo is hard to shake.
But it wasn't just the status quo which was shaken last night. Up until yesterday evening, this afternoon's proposal to open up Croke Park to other sports had it all to do. It remains to be seen what impact the announcement of £60 million in Government aid has on the debate but the anticipated antagonists of tradition and insularity cannot be unaffected by the sheer scope of the financial assistance announced.
According to GAA Director General Liam Mulvihill, the overdraft now needed to complete the redevelopment is down to £25 million. "By 2005 or 2006, the debt burden of the stadium should be gone," he said last night.
Not alone has the rebuilding of Croke Park been transformed at a stroke from a worrying liability to a major asset but the funding of games development and promotion - thought to be threatened by the running costs of the stadium - has now been assured by further Government commitments.
There are still precedents to justify pessimism on the part of this afternoon's reformers. Part of this is the resistance to change. Only a year ago, a motion to prohibit any discussion of change to the playing rules for 10 years was enthusiastically passed.
Ten years ago, Dublin put forward a motion to allow sponsors' names on the front of county jerseys. This was a provision with obvious commercial benefits for everyone and with nothing like the historical baggage of this afternoon's proposal. Yet it scraped home by just one vote more than the necessary weighted majority.
On its 30th anniversary, the deletion of the infamous ban on foreign games remains the only occasion on which the GAA has stepped back from the taste for cultural apartheid bequeathed it by its nationalist past. Significantly, that victory for reform was achieved by unique means - giving the rank-and-file a say in the form of a plebiscite organised at club level. A similar procedure applied to today's Roscommon motion would result in the opposition being blown out of the water.
The central question around the Burlington Hotel last night was to what extent the debate would be affected by the announcement. Delegates seemed genuinely perplexed by the consequences of this massive windfall. On the one hand, the financial incentive to admit other sports to Croke Park has evaporated at a stroke but on the other, how can an organisation - even as unconcerned about its public image as the GAA can be at times - take such a large public donation and then turn its back on the sports community at large?
So far the debate on Rule 42 - which is used to prohibit other sports from being played on GAA grounds - has been muted. Rather than take a wider tack, it has focused on the financial benefits of letting Croke Park for soccer and rugby internationals.
A year ago, former GAA president Peter Quinn flew a kite at congress, pointing out that the costs of the Croke Park redevelopment could be partly funded by allowing other sports. This was significant because Quinn was regarded as conservative on this, of all, issues. His presidency's most enduring interlude centred on a controversial proposal for a double bill, to feature a football match and a soccer match at the RDS in Dublin.
Yet Quinn, who is a business consultant, is also the person within the GAA who has the strongest grasp of the redevelopment - which was initiated during his presidency - and its finances. If he was leaning in a certain direction, there was good reason for doing so. His current successor, Sean McCague, went out of his way to project a more conciliatory attitude towards the prospect of other sports being played in Croke Park.
Does last night's news mean that there are now no good reasons to support reform? Initial indications are that the leadership would like to see the motion succeed. Sean McCague's announcement of the funding last night contained conciliatory references to "sitting down with the other sporting organisations in the context of the opportunity and vista which these developments present".
The problem is that although there is virtual unanimity at Croke Park level about the desirability of broadening the revenue potential of the redevelopment in this way, nobody at the top of the organisation is leading the charge. It is customary for those in leadership positions to avoid taking a stand on matters tabled on the congress clar. This may be the convention but it leaves advocates of change with one hand tied behind their back.
Battle will be focused on motion six, from Roscommon. This proposes that Central Council have the power to authorise the use of Croke Park for field games other than those controlled by the association. Two other motions, from Longford and Laois, are more wideranging and propose a general relaxation of the rule. Neither will succeed and they may even be withdrawn to concentrate energies on motion six. The counties met this morning to consider their strategy in the light of last night's news.
There are three points of consideration in the debate. The first, financial argument has been distorted on both sides. Realistic assessments of the value to the GAA of a major soccer or rugby international indicate that Croke Park could make between £250,000 and £300,000 on a calculation of 15 per cent of all revenue - gate, perimeter advertising and television. This is based on a full house, by no means guaranteed except for one or two matches a year and if the Government's Stadium Ireland is built in a few years, the business will be gone west, literally.
Yet even in its Government-sponsored land of plenty the GAA may not sniff at a new revenue stream of between £1 million and £1.5 million, even for a few years.
Secondly there is the administrative argument. The Roscommon motion literally proposes to devolve authority for the relaxation of Rule 42 from Congress to Central Council. Whereas there is an obvious subtext, the reform is more gradual than revolutionary.
One frustrated, senior provincial official put it this way: "No one seems to understand what this is about. It's not saying that as soon as the Roscommon motion is passed, we have to have a soccer match in Croke Park on the Sunday. It's saying: let Central Council sort this out when it sees fit. "There may come a stage when the time is right and there's no opportunity to get 300 people together for a congress. The GAA needs to be able to respond quickly - which it can't do at the moment."
Thirdly, there is the public mood to consider. The GAA is famously deaf to what the public at large thinks of its decisions but as a large, independent organisation, it has the right to its own opinions. There are apparently no strings attached to the Government offer but there will be unmerciful political heat if the public learns about this £60 million grant less than 24 hours before it hears that the GAA has affirmed its old isolationist nostrums.
In this brave new world of lavish public funding for sport, it should be embarrassing for the GAA to continue to turn its back on the sporting preferences of other Irish people. No one expects Croke Park to be handed over rent-free to soccer and rugby internationals but an acknowledgment of the communality of sport would be appropriate in the light of public generosity - particularly if Stadium Ireland comes on stream in five years' time and removes this need for sharing Croke Park.
Which also prompts questions about Government stadium policy. All the current indicators are that the Abbotstown project is proceeding at pace but there still hasn't been a spade stuck in the ground. The Taoiseach and Minister for Sport may remain solidly committed to the development of the national stadium but five years is a long time.
How much public enthusiasm (such as it is) will survive changed economic circumstances if there are two 80,000capacity stadiums in the pipeline? If the GAA does the right thing this afternoon, there will be an opportunity to reassess the scale of Stadium Ireland and maybe revise its capacity to 40,000 or so. If the Government wants it, a perfect exit strategy.
