GAA going pro poll

JonnyCash10

I think the gaa inter county teams should be fully professional,if rugby and auusie rules can do it so can we.Im not lookin for a big debate as to the reasons why they should/shouldnt im simply looking for your opinion in the poll where i have multiple choice answers.

Feel free to tell us how you voted and leave two or three bullet points as to why you chose that vote

Thanks

rebel girl 15

NO-its against the ethos of the GAA

Where is the poll??

Anyway, I think that it would be great for the players if it could go professional, but the funds are not there to do so according to a number of studies. Even if they did go pro, there isn't enough money to set a guy up for the years after his retirement, so by paying him when he is playing, you are actually doing the guy a disservice by not having him out working. What I think should happen, is that the players are employed by county boards and work as games development officers, especially if guys are out of work and getting into all schools and coaching the kids - imagine being a 8 or 9 year old and getting coaching from one of your heros that you watch play on the TV - think it would ensure that more kids would choose GAA. Take the situation in Tipp, where John Evans was told by Croke Park that he couldn't be paid as the Tipp Director of Football and manage a team as well

edit - poll is there now! Voted yes - but that it is not viable.

JonnyCash10

YES-They should,but for various reasons its not viable

I voted yes

1-I believe the training and time the players put in should be rewarded financially.

2-There may be many issues and problems that would arise,but for these problems a solution can be found.

3-I believe that the pros although maybe fewer outweigh the cons.

Diabhal Beag

YES-They should,but for various reasons its not viable

Think intercounty players should be given rewards. The further they get the more the reward. If the game went pro altogether I don't think it would be the end but there is only so little they can get. Its not a worldwide sport like soccer or rugby and it doesn't have a huge market like NFL or NBA.

Even 5000 euro a year as compensation for costs etc would be enough IMO.

JonnyCash10

YES-They should,but for various reasons its not viable

Thanks for the input rebelgirl,the poll was late as i was finalising the wording of the options,you can click more than one vote in this poll guys,multiple choice

An Citeog

JonnyCash10 wrote: »

I think the gaa inter county teams should be fully professional,if rugby and auusie rules can do it so can we.Im not lookin for a big debate as to the reasons why they should/shouldnt im simply looking for your opinion in the poll where i have multiple choice answers.

Feel free to tell us how you voted and leave two or three bullet points as to why you chose that vote

Thanks

There are only 4 professional rugby teams in Ireland and Australia has quadruple the population that we have.

Anyway, I voted no because I see absolutely no benefit to pay for play. First of all, does everybody on the panel get paid and who sets the remuneration? Do players from bigger counties who bring in more revenue get paid the most? Should players then be allowed transfer to wherever pays the most?

It's not as if the GAA has huge piles of cash earning a couple of percent a year. Even €5,000 per player with 30 players on a panel is €150,000 per year per team. Multiply that by every county you deem eligible, both hurling and football and that's a huge amount of extra revenue that the GAA would need to bring in every year.

There are clubs throughout the country facing serious financial difficulty at the moment and they're the ones who need the support of the GAA and their respective county boards the most. There are tweaks that can be made here and there for the benefit of players and members but on the whole, drastic change like you're suggesting would have a huge negative impact imho.

Clareman

I don't think it's viable for GAA to be professional in any shape, as An Citeog mentions the financials involved just wouldn't be possible. Give players an average industrial wage (~32k a year), 30 players per squad, 2 squads per country (hurling & football) and 32 counties, that's €61,440,000 in salaries a year.

Soccer is very much in trouble and that's probably the most lucrative sport in the world, most of the top teams are massively in debt and teams are going into administration on a regular basis (Portsmouth and Leeds in recent years).

I would be in favour of both teams getting a cut of the gate of games though.

bren2001

I don't think the GAA should go pro.

Firstly its isnt finacially viable. Yes the GAA makes a large profit most years but not enough to pay every player in the country. To cover costs and to still make a profit to reinvest back into the grassroots ticket prices would have to increase. This would substantially reduce attendances at league games and the earlier rounds of the championship. Years back Dublin tickets were like golddust. Last year I got my ticket for the All Ireland Semi Final on the Nally two days before.

Secondly, at what point does it become professional? Just at county level? This would destroy clubs in everywhere as contracts would have to be drawn up and county players would not be able to play for their own clubs.

However, I do believe that some financial contribution must be made to the players e.g. travel costs to training etc. Possibly for the All Ireland winning team a fee should be paid to them to cover all the overtime that they have lost etc. But a professional GAA would flop. We dont have enough supporters to cover the costs.

bruschi

it is completley un workable. the whole set up doesnt lend itself to the system.

take hurling for example. I am an average club hurler, but have played in norhtern parts of the country and against top players of some counties. If I moved to one of them, can I play for said county? and get paid? how would you stop players transferring to take advantage?

and the clubs would suffer. take Oulart in Wexford, who had 8 players in the panel for Wexford last week. Can those players still play for their clubs? Or are they contracted to the county? And what about players who are in and out of county panels? Just say half way through a season, someone is playing great stuff in a local championship, can they be advanced to the county team? and if so, what happens the player who is dropped?

and this is without even talking about the lack of funds. Players should certainly be reimbursed for costs, and above that. But to substantiate a wage for them could never happen.

jordainius

Absolutely not. Ticket prices would have to soar to make it sustainable, and the championships would have to be expanded further into overbloated league formats in order to provide enough games in order for teams to make enought money to stay afloat.

Players who would now be contracted to their county would very rarely; if ever play for their clubs. Take the provincial rugby teams for instance- the clubs pretty much permanently lose their best players as soon as a province comes calling.

Another thing that would HAVE to stop would be free to air games on TV.

Also, I'm not going to watch my county play if the 15 players representing my county are doing so because they are being paid. I want to know that they are honoured to wear the jersey, that they are willing to give up so much of their free time because they love my county.

Players deserve expenses, and to be taken care of if they get injured, and to be given a thank you at the end of a season in the form of a holiday or something like that. At present this is fairly close to what they are getting. I also feel that restrictions need to be imposed regarding how often players train and so on.

aidan24326

NO-its against the ethos of the GAA

JonnyCash10 wrote: »

2-There may be many issues and problems that would arise,but for these problems a solution can be found.

There's not enough money for it to be workable, and that's the one problem that has no solution.

bren2001 wrote: »

Secondly, at what point does it become professional? Just at county level? This would destroy clubs in everywhere as contracts would have to be drawn up and county players would not be able to play for their own clubs.

The only way it even could work is if players were contracted to the county only i.e they don't play for their clubs. As we all know this would do untold damage to the club scene, which is the heartbeat of the whole thing.

jordainius wrote: »

Another thing that would HAVE to stop would be free to air games on TV.

That's one I hadn't thought of, considering that it's TV money that largely bankrolls soccer. However, GAA doesn't have enough of an audience to even make that viable. GAA probably has an audience here of maybe 500K, prem league soccer has an audience of 10s of millions.

Players deserve expenses, and to be taken care of if they get injured, and to be given a thank you at the end of a season in the form of a holiday or something like that.

They pretty much get that already along with travel expenses etc. I know a lad that was on the Kildare panel a couple of years ago and he told me his expenses cheque at the end of the Summer would come to about 3 grand. It's not big money but I expect it's enough to cover your expenses anyway, plus they get free gear aswell, boots, training tops etc.

jordainius

Also, think of it this way; at present, county boards aren't exactly awash with money. To pay a panel of 30 players a salary of €30,000** a year would require an extra €900,000 to be raised annually, and that's only per code. Then the likes of Limerick, Cork, Galway, Dublin, Offaly and most strong hurling counties would have to stump up double this amount.

Kilkenny would in all likelyhood not have a professional football team giving their hurlers an unfair advantage over other hurling counties who wouldn't be able to pay as much.

The likes of Waterford, Tipperary and other strong hurling counties would have to give serious consideration as to whether or not they should solely focus on hurling in order to maximise their resources on their stronger code.

About 20 counties would not go professional in hurling; who knows what harm could be done to hurling in those counties.

Leitrim; a population of 27,000: how are they expected to compete? They'll never get massive crowds and they'll be far behind other counties in terms of merchandise and other such revenue.

Also, counties will have to pay management, coaching staff, physios and so on.

Where do people think this money would come from?? The fans would be the ones to pay. And there would be less money available to be given to clubs to buy equipment and upgrade training facilities and pitches and so on.

And ultimately, in both codes the gap between the best teams and the rest would just get larger and larger.


**A sum of money which is probably far below what some players earn in their full time jobs as it stands...

timogen

jordainius got there before me.What about the player that disrupts his life to play as pro only to get injured after a year.you could get people that would be finiancally destroyed because of it.

JonnyCash10

YES-They should,but for various reasons its not viable

Keep the votes coming guys

A little surprised that option b hasnt got more clicks

some interesting points have been made here so far

JonnyCash10

YES-They should,but for various reasons its not viable

"Australia has quadruple the population that we have."Indeed they do but when you consider the possibilities with tv revenue on the back of these figures...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_diaspora 1 million

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_diaspora 80 million

Cant help but feel alot more could be done marketing and pr wise abroad

In fairness if you didnt enjoy watching hurlin (the fastest sport in the world) there IS somethin wrong wit ya!And im a football man

Rented Mule

So players should be able to move freely around from county to county to get the best offers ?

bren2001

JonnyCash10 wrote: »

"Australia has quadruple the population that we have."Indeed they do but when you consider the possibilities with tv revenue on the back of these figures...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_diaspora 1 million

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_diaspora 80 million

Cant help but feel alot more could be done marketing and pr wise abroad

In fairness if you didnt enjoy watching hurlin (the fastest sport in the world) there IS somethin wrong wit ya!And im a football man

These people don't tune into the Championship already.Why would they start to tune in if it became professional? The quality of the game wouldn't dramatically increase.

Flukey

It would destroy the game as we know it. One of the beauties of the game is that it is amateur and people are playing for the pride of the shirt, the club and their county, not a pay packet. You get a few moving, but the majority are playing for their own, be it club or county. How many English premiership teams could line out 11 players in their correct positions from their locality? How many could even line out 11 Englishmen? It is only when the players of other sports play for their international teams that they are playing for their own. It brings out a different passion.

Watching a GAA club or county playing, compared to a soccer club playing, you can see the difference in approach. They are really playing with their heart and soul. A soccer player could be playing for one club one week, and playing against them for another club the next. They don't have a commitment to their team in the way GAA players have or even in the way they would when they are playing for their country.

Players following the money would decimate some teams. There are high profile players playing for the big teams in England, who would be playing for their local club if it wasn't professional or if they had the commitment to their locality and birthplace that GAA players have, or they do for their country. If the star soccer player in the country was still playing for his local club, Useless United, they wouldn't be such a bad team. Professionalism has pulled him away from his local team. We don't want that in GAA. Amateurism is the key in keeping it the way it is.

Tescoboat52

It would both destroy the game as we know it and is against the ethos of the GAA. Keep it as it is.

aidan24326

NO-its against the ethos of the GAA

Rented Mule wrote: »

So players should be able to move freely around from county to county to get the best offers ?

You've hit on an interesting point here. Due to employment law, it would almost certainly be illegal to stop players moving from one team to another if more money was being offered, bevause you'd be infriging on their employment rights. It would kill the game as we know it, all the best players would naturally want to play for the team with the most money, and you'd end up with a handful of super-teams with the weaker counties cleaned out of whatever good players they have.