Why does the GAA receive so much funding?

Cill94

I'm doing a Sport Science course and recently we were discussing the allocation of funding to different sports in Ireland. The GAA (apparently) has around €120m at its disposal. And yet the sports which are played professionally and allow us to compete on an international stage (rugby and soccer for example) are left with €30m to be spread amongst them and 30 other sports. What makes this more puzzling is that the GAA sports aren't even the most popular team sports in Ireland - football/soccer is.

So why is it that a sport in which the players aren't paid, and which isn't the most popular, receives the most funding? Is it because of the GAA's 'Irishness', or its history?

(The facts above are all according to my lecturer btw, I was always under the impression that hurling and gaelic were the most popular sports)

Davin Stand

I would say that your lecturer has not a clue what he is talking about. You should ask him some time to tell you where is the 120 million that the GAA has at its disposal. To me he sounds like a chancer. Does not say much about the standard of lecturers in your college.

Professey Chin

Only number I can find is 3.5m and thats from 2007/2008
Your lecturer is talking through his arse

Squidgy Black

Your lecturer's a spoof and a half, almost every single person in Ireland's played GAA as a child and just look at the League of Ireland, it's hardly more popular in Ireland.

As for the funding, the GAA has to provide funding for 32 county boards also, ticket sales are limited for league games because of small stadiums and low prices.

blue note

His figures are utter nonsense.

Duckworth_Luas

I didn't know you could study Sports Science Fiction nowadays!

Cill94

stetyrrell wrote: »

almost every single person in Ireland's played GAA as a child

I never did and as none of my friends went to GAA schools, neither did they. I think it's more of a cultural thing outside of Dublin.

stetyrrell wrote: »

and just look at the League of Ireland, it's hardly more popular in Ireland.

Yeah but what about all the Irish people who follow the Premier League and other European clubs?

Cill94

I'll ask him where he got the figures from then!

Davin Stand

I look forward to hearing his answer.

blue note

Cill94 wrote: »

I never did and as none of my friends went to GAA schools, neither did they. I think it's more of a cultural thing outside of Dublin.



Yeah but what about all the Irish people who follow the Premier League and other European clubs?

Ha, maybe we should give the funding to premier league teams!

And I'd say there's barely a school outside of the north that doesn't have gaa teams in at least 1 discipline.

But anyway, let him say where he got his figures from. And where he got his figures from re participation - I'd guess that running is right up there now judging by the amount of joggers around. And golf is massive - about a quarter of a million GUI / ilgu members. People participate at sports at different levels and I'd say gaa players give far more commitment than most other sports. Half the people who play soccer play 5-a-side once a week. I'm not knocking it and used to do it, but it's nothing next to commitment to a gaa team.

Syferus

Cill94 wrote: »

I'm doing a Sport Science course and recently we were discussing the allocation of funding to different sports in Ireland. The GAA (apparently) has around €120m at its disposal. And yet the sports which are played professionally and allow us to compete on an international stage (rugby and soccer for example) are left with €30m to be spread amongst them and 30 other sports. What makes this more puzzling is that the GAA sports aren't even the most popular team sports in Ireland - football/soccer is.

So why is it that a sport in which the players aren't paid, and which isn't the most popular, receives the most funding? Is it because of the GAA's 'Irishness', or its history?

(The facts above are all according to my lecturer btw, I was always under the impression that hurling and gaelic were the most popular sports)

I cannot believe anyone, let alone a 3rd level lecturer who I assume is accredited, would come out with that.

If he or you actually believes that there's little point talking about funding until the actual metrics are understood.

Cill94

blue note wrote: »

I'd say gaa players give far more commitment than most other sports.

How?

Squidgy Black

I'm from the Northside, and within say a 20 mile radius I can list about 15 gaa clubs that are thriving with full squads, most with 3 teams at almost every age group. If you count the 6 or so games played in Croke Park during the summer that sell out for 82,000, that there I'd say is well more than the amount of people who go to soccer games.

I'd say at least every 3 out of 5 lads I know have played GAA either with a juvenile team when they were younger or still do.

Everyone watches soccer, but to say it's the most popular is far from the truth.

Clareman

That is 1 of the most idiotic lecturers I've ever heard from and I would normally say that someone was trolling, but I'm going to assume it's not a troll.

The GAA (apparently) has around €120m at its disposal. - If it does, and to be honest I would doubt that severely, I would imagine a lot of that money would be in real estate (i.e. pitches & club houses) as well as from revenue from selling their sports (i.e. TV & ticket revenues). The GAA's total revenue each year is ~€50 million

And yet the sports which are played professionally and allow us to compete on an international stage (rugby and soccer for example) are left with €30m to be spread amongst them and 30 other sports. - There are far more than 30 other sports played in Ireland, I don't see how other sports should be worried about what the GAA are recouping, surely they should worry about themselves and getting their own houses in order. The 2 sports that you mention do have international stages which means they have more revenue streams as well as having players paid for out of other economies.

What makes this more puzzling is that the GAA sports aren't even the most popular team sports in Ireland - football/soccer is. - Soccer does have the highest TV audiences, but this is due to a lot of reasons, for example, Premiership soccer as well as the fact soccer programs are generally on primetime TV whereas GAA isn't. The GAA has far and beyond the most players and clubs as well as participation rates.

So why is it that a sport in which the players aren't paid, and which isn't the most popular, receives the most funding? Is it because of the GAA's 'Irishness', or its history? - It's simply because they are the largest sporting organisation in the country with most players & clubs.

(The facts above are all according to my lecturer btw, I was always under the impression that hurling and gaelic were the most popular sports), €120 million might be the income of the GAA which is where he's getting the figures from. I would even question that football/soccer is the most popular sport, yes TV figures show that more people watch soccer, but that's a lot to do with the fact that those sports are shown at prime time rather than

kupus

Heres the problems with teachers these days....... They give advise to malleable impressionable young adults just starting out in life, who thinks the sun moon and stars shine out the arse end of these lecturers. For what reason I havent a clue, maybe the kids think their lecturers are intelligent or worldly or a bit of both, and their word is god.

They believe most things said by these guys as they know no different. And sadly again Im am proved correct by what the OP has wrote.
OP heres some free advise, when your teacher makes some claim, question yourself WHY is he making this claim, whats the angle and whats his agenda.

kupus

OH and as for calling rugby a worldwide sport come off it dude. its played professionally in a handful of countries and has realistically only 4-5 teams who are going to win a world cup, Im a former player of rugby but im not blinkered into believing the hype of world rugby. Many people when I tell them about rugby haven't a foggiest clue of what I'm talking about.

If you want to talk about world sports then sub basketball with rugby, or handball, or waterpolo or volleyball. A lot more countries play these sports so if you need validation or a pat on the head for an irish team doing well. These sports would be a good place to start.

ONe more thing great to see the old gaelic sport of handball taken off very well in Usa and Mexico, too bad they knocked a lot of the free courts that were available year round in Ireland. So at least some Irish sport is making headway outside of Ireland!!

Wacker The Attacker

Someone has to clear kildares debts

Fight_Night

kupus wrote: »

OH and as for calling rugby a worldwide sport come off it dude. its played professionally in a handful of countries and has realistically only 4-5 teams who are going to win a world cup, Im a former player of rugby but im not blinkered into believing the hype of world rugby. Many people when I tell them about rugby haven't a foggiest clue of what I'm talking about.

If you want to talk about world sports then sub basketball with rugby, or handball, or waterpolo or volleyball. A lot more countries play these sports so if you need validation or a pat on the head for an irish team doing well. These sports would be a good place to start.

Rugby is a worldwide sport. Not up for discussion.

Clareman

Rugby has it's own forum with very nice (and attractive) mods if you want to discuss it.

Cill94

kupus wrote: »

Heres the problems with teachers these days....... They give advise to malleable impressionable young adults just starting out in life, who thinks the sun moon and stars shine out the arse end of these lecturers. For what reason I havent a clue, maybe the kids think their lecturers are intelligent or worldly or a bit of both, and their word is god.

They believe most things said by these guys as they know no different. And sadly again Im am proved correct by what the OP has wrote.
OP heres some free advise, when your teacher makes some claim, question yourself WHY is he making this claim, whats the angle and whats his agenda.

The very reason I created this topic was because I found what the lecturer said hard to believe and thought that people who actually know a good deal about the sport would be able to shine some light on the subject. I never once said that the figures I was given were true.

Don't be so quick to assume things of people.

Also I'll respect that this is not the place for discussing the status of rugby but you cannot dispute that rugby is an international sport. A sport does not have to be played at a high level in every single country for it to be on an international level. That's all I'll say on that.

aidan24326

When people say that some CEO of a major company or some Russian oligarch is worth 10 billion it doesn't mean that he has billions in cash swimming around in his bank account. Most of that will be tied up in assets - real estate, stock, stock options etc etc

What the lecturer may have meant (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt) is that the GAA are 'worth' 120 million. This wouldn't be an unreasonable figure when you consider the value of all the stadia they own. However they can't exactly sell Croke Park whatever it might be worth, so I think the lecturer was either being disingenuous or else the OP misunderstood or is misrepresenting what he actually said.

premierstone

aidan24326 wrote: »

When people say that some CEO of a major company or some Russian oligarch is worth 10 billion it doesn't mean that he has billions in cash swimming around in his bank account. Most of that will be tied up in assets - real estate, stock, stock options etc etc

What the lecturer may have meant (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt) is that the GAA are 'worth' 120 million. This wouldn't be an unreasonable figure when you consider the value of all the stadia they own. However they can't exactly sell Croke Park whatever it might be worth, so I think the lecturer was either being disingenuous or else the OP misunderstood or is misrepresenting what he actually said.

If what I have bolded is what the lecturer was alluding to then it is also way way off the mark, the true figure would be many multiple of €120m.

You might find that your lecturer was a very average GAA juvenile player who didn't make the grade and has held an un-natural grudge ever since.

8k2q1gfcz9s5d4

Syferus wrote: »

I cannot believe anyone, let alone a 3rd level lecturer who I assume is accredited, would come out with that.

It depends on how you look at it, GAA is probably the most played sport, but soccer would be the most watched

Clareman

Soccer would be the most popular viewed on TV sport, GAA would be the highest attended and played sport.

iDave

The GAA has more clubs in Cork than Rugby has on the whole island. Not sure of the soccer comparison but all you have to do is drive around a selection of 10 villages, each will have a GAA club with I'd say half at best have a soccer club. The government hands out funds based on participation not Sky Sports subscriptions.
Also the GAA is the governing body of our nation sports, meaning they hold a cultural value others dont. The GAA fully deserves additional funding.

paddy no 11

Cork has 220 gaa clubs, i'd say it probably has a max of 40 rugby clubs.

Ask your lecturer about his numbers again.

qwertyuiopa

Tell your lecturer to read this article from last year..Very informative

http://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/league-of-ireland/fai-receive-greater-slice-of-grants-than-gaa-2965916.html

Read an interview in Indo with John Delaney where he said that FAI received more government grant aid this year than any other sporting organisation..unfortunately cant find said interview online

nice_guy80

most of the people who play soccer do so in five-a-side astro turf

The GAA has (more or less) 6 sports
football
hurling
handball
rounders
camogie
ladies football

there are more handball clubs in Ireland than rugby, hockey and tennis combined.

phkk

OP, inform your lecturer that there is only one rugby club in all of Co Kilkenny!!(could be starting a new debate!!)

Realt Dearg Sec

phkk wrote: »

OP, inform your lecturer that there is only one rugby club in all of Co Kilkenny!!(could be starting a new debate!!)

Sure no wonder they are so successful when they pay no attention to other codes. Kilkenny county board should be forced to divert half their funds to rugby or else their funding should be cut. They should also divert half their funds to football, half to handball, half to soccer, half to tiddleywinks, and half to the Saint Vincent De Paul.

What's not clear to me is this: where the lecturer says the GAA has 120 million at its disposal...what exactly is the problem? Setting aside the fact the figures seem to have been plucked from thin air, is he saying that this money is coming out of taxpayers' pockets? Or is he saying that it is simply wrong that an amateur sport has a bigger income than some professional ones? Or what? It really isn't clear, so maybe it is unfair to be attacking the lecturer on here when we have no idea what he actually was talking about.

BnB

Cill94 wrote: »

....Yeah but what about all the Irish people who follow the Premier League and other European clubs?

WTF do you want the government to do for them....? Pay their Sky Sports Subscriptions ?

dirtyden

Cill94 wrote: »

The very reason I created this topic was because I found what the lecturer said hard to believe and thought that people who actually know a good deal about the sport would be able to shine some light on the subject. I never once said that the figures I was given were true.

Don't be so quick to assume things of people.

Also I'll respect that this is not the place for discussing the status of rugby but you cannot dispute that rugby is an international sport. A sport does not have to be played at a high level in every single country for it to be on an international level. That's all I'll say on that.

Name of course or university?

What you have called figures here you called facts in the original post.


Of course you may simply have biased the lecturers facts to suit your opinions also.
Anyone with 5 minutes googling time could tear your 'lecturers' facts to shreds unless the figures he quotes are a fudge to suit his opinion rather than any actual reasonable facts.

From the lecture he surely had some evidence to support these extraordinary figures? The GAA gets 4 times more funding than all other sports in Ireland combined (or all the other important professional sports at least as you have indicated)? What is this funding he speaks of?

MD1990

Soccer is the most played team sport in Ireland though seen it on a survey
too much politics in GAA tbh

Hammer Archer

MD1990 wrote: »

Soccer is the most played team sport in Ireland though seen it on a survey
too much politics in GAA tbh

Link?
By 'played' do you mean a few lads having a kickabout or playing in an actual team? Because it certainly isn't if you mean the latter. Just going by my own county, there are around 60 GAA clubs compared to (according to Soccer Ireland) around 40 soccer clubs. My local GAA club would have around 50 teams in all age groups in men's and ladies' football, hurling and camogie. My local soccer club wouldn't have nearly as many teams.

I'd also like it if you could expand on your last point.

nice_guy80

Realt Dearg Sec wrote: »

Sure no wonder they are so successful when they pay no attention to other codes. Kilkenny county board should be forced to divert half their funds to rugby or else their funding should be cut. They should also divert half their funds to football, half to handball, half to soccer, half to tiddleywinks, and half to the Saint Vincent De Paul.

What's not clear to me is this: where the lecturer says the GAA has 120 million at its disposal...what exactly is the problem? Setting aside the fact the figures seem to have been plucked from thin air, is he saying that this money is coming out of taxpayers' pockets? Or is he saying that it is simply wrong that an amateur sport has a bigger income than some professional ones? Or what? It really isn't clear, so maybe it is unfair to be attacking the lecturer on here when we have no idea what he actually was talking about.

I think you'll find handball is already funded by the GAA
and Kilkenny are very good at handball

robbiezero

Would be inclined to give the lecturer the benefit of the doubt as the info is coming to us second hand from a guy who thinks:

the GAA - "I think it's more of a cultural thing outside of Dublin".

GAA is huge in Dublin.

and that soccer should receive more funding because:

"Yeah but what about all the Irish people who follow the Premier League and other European clubs?"

8k2q1gfcz9s5d4

GAA will always be the most played sport in Ireland. However, lots of kids are pressured into playing gaa over soccer/rugby at a young age which is wrong. When I was in national school, one of our neighboring schools were only allowed to play hurling or football at lunch time, and got given out to for playing soccer. The principal was a high up guy in the GAA at the time. Even our senior football players that play soccer are told to "give up that soccer" a lot.

kupus

Aileen Large Gentry wrote: »

GAA will always be the most played sport in Ireland. However, lots of kids are pressured into playing gaa over soccer/rugby at a young age which is wrong. When I was in national school, one of our neighboring schools were only allowed to play hurling or football at lunch time, and got given out to for playing soccer. The principal was a high up guy in the GAA at the time. Even our senior football players that play soccer are told to "give up that soccer" a lot.

BS.....No kid can be pressured into playing a sport if they dont want to. I played a variety of sports. in school and in the local town...ANd not one manager EVER told me to choose one sport. And you're talking about an adult being told to give up that soccer, sorry I dont buy it.
When you reach adulthood usually what happens is you decide for yourself.

antoobrien

Cill94 wrote: »

I'm doing a Sport Science course and recently we were discussing the allocation of funding to different sports in Ireland. The GAA (apparently) has around €120m at its disposal.

Rubbish - tell that twit to do some basic research, then resign because he/she shouldn't be teaching.

The GAA's total revenues last year came to €46.8m. Of that 6% came from government allocations, the rest came from the organisation's own activities. Here's the breakdown taken from this years annual report to congress

GAA total revenue 2011 (10 months recorded): €46,862,612
Sources:
Gate Receipts: 52% - €24,211,963
Commercial Revenue: 32% - €15,210,228
Other Income: 10% - €4,684,978
State Funding: 6% - €2,755,443 (mostly sports council grants)

The VAT generated by people spending money to attend matches (petrol, diesel, transport fares, food drink etc) will pay for that allocation a few times over.

Cill94 wrote: »

And yet the sports which are played professionally and allow us to compete on an international stage (rugby and soccer for example) are left with €30m to be spread amongst them and 30 other sports.

The total allocation for the sports you refer in 2011 was €31.86m.

The 2011 grants for the "other professional sports" were €25.6m, with a further 9m going to the FAI, IRFU and GAA.

Of that the breakdown was:
FAI - €3.35m
IRFU - €2.91
GAA - €2.97

Cill94 wrote: »

What makes this more puzzling is that the GAA sports aren't even the most popular team sports in Ireland - football/soccer is.

So why is it that a sport in which the players aren't paid, and which isn't the most popular, receives the most funding? Is it because of the GAA's 'Irishness', or its history?

It is because of attendances and popularity. Soccer comes in a poor 4th to Rugby in 3rd with Hurling in second and Gaelic top of the pile.

League of Ireland - total attendance 107,714
Highest attendence - 5,621
Average attendence - 1,683

Rabbo direct pro 12 2011-12
Total attendance (for 4 nations) - 1,042,374
Average 7,721


GAA 2011:
Total attendance of All Ireland Hurling & football championships: 1,325,953

Realt Dearg Sec

antoobrien wrote: »

Rubbish - tell that twit to do some basic research, then resign because he/she shouldn't be teaching.

The GAA's total revenues last year came to €46.8m. Of that 6% came from government allocations, the rest came from the organisation's own activities. Here's the breakdown taken from this years annual report to congress

GAA total revenue 2011 (10 months recorded): €46,862,612
Sources:
Gate Receipts: 52% - €24,211,963
Commercial Revenue: 32% - €15,210,228
Other Income: 10% - €4,684,978
State Funding: 6% - €2,755,443 (mostly sports council grants)

The VAT generated by people spending money to attend matches (petrol, diesel, transport fares, food drink etc) will pay for that allocation a few times over.




The total allocation for the sports you refer in 2011 was €31.86m.

The 2011 grants for the "other professional sports" were €25.6m, with a further 9m going to the FAI, IRFU and GAA.

Of that the breakdown was:
FAI - €3.35m
IRFU - €2.91
GAA - €2.97



It is because of attendances and popularity. Soccer comes in a poor 4th to Rugby in 3rd with Hurling in second and Gaelic top of the pile.

League of Ireland - total attendance 107,714
Highest attendence - 5,621
Average attendence - 1,683

Rabbo direct pro 12 2011-12
Total attendance (for 4 nations) - 1,042,374
Average 7,721


GAA 2011:
Total attendance of All Ireland Hurling & football championships: 1,325,953

Yay, facts! Thread over, nonsense defeated.

8k2q1gfcz9s5d4

kupus wrote: »

BS.....No kid can be pressured into playing a sport if they dont want to.

Its not BS, the principal of the school (small rural school) was very heavly involved in the GAA and would give out to them for playing soccer. He retired around 13 years ago. Everyone in the shcool was made play football, hurling or camogie for the school team. Bear in mind this was the 80s and 90s when parents didnt complain to teachers.

kupus wrote: »

I played a variety of sports. in school and in the local town...ANd not one manager EVER told me to choose one sport. And you're talking about an adult being told to give up that soccer, sorry I dont buy it.
When you reach adulthood usually what happens is you decide for yourself.

No manager ever should tell anyone to choose one sport, but when they have training on the same evenings as the soccer club (same evening the soccer club always trains), what can they do? Its not an issue every year, it depends on the mgmt of the football team. Last year the mgmt was not very considerate of the 10+ players that also played soccer, so in the end the lads put the soccer first. The soccer team gained promotion and won the cup, the football team that contested the county senior semi final 3 years earlier were relegated.

The "give up that soccer" does happen, but mainly in small clubs where there is a lot of overlap between the 2 sports. It happened me at underage, where some GAA trainers looked down on soccer.

BnB

We're gone well off topic here, but just to reply to the last post.....

The "give up sport X" thing happens in every sport, at every age group.

It is just a fact of life and is not unique to the GAA. It certainly happens between Rugby and the GAA in Munster as the likes of Darren Sweetman has shown.

If you have a very good player on your team, you are going to try and hold onto him. Some managers will take the road of maybe giving them more leeway, others will try and take a hard line and pressure them into choosing one sport.

It even happens internally in the GAA between hurling & football. I'd like to hear a Kilkenny minor hurler tell his manager that he can't come training because he has a gaelic football match..!!!!

You also mentioned that "some GAA trainers look down on soccer". Again - this is true and is wrong - Sport is sport and no sport should be looked down on. But it is most certainly not unique to the GAA. IMO, there is an awful lot more snobbery in Ireland towards the GAA, than there is coming from it.

Clareman

Aileen Large Gentry wrote: »

Its not BS, the principal of the school (small rural school) was very heavly involved in the GAA and would give out to them for playing soccer. He retired around 13 years ago. Everyone in the shcool was made play football, hurling or camogie for the school team. Bear in mind this was the 80s and 90s when parents didnt complain to teachers.

I went to a rural school in the 80s, 4 teachers, Tuesday afternoons the boys played hurling with the headmaster, the girls did arts and crafts with the infants teacher, on Wednesday it was vice-vearsa, if any boy didn't want to play they did arts and crafts 2 evenings, same went for the girls, there was 2 fellas who didn't play hurling (but played soccer) nothing was ever said to them, in fact we all played soccer at lunch so no-one would be left out.

antoobrien

BnB wrote: »

We're gone well off topic here, but just to reply to the last post.....

The "give up sport X" thing happens in every sport, at every age group.

It is just a fact of life and is not unique to the GAA. It certainly happens between Rugby and the GAA in Munster as the likes of Darren Sweetman has shown.

If you have a very good player on your team, you are going to try and hold onto him. Some managers will take the road of maybe giving them more leeway, others will try and take a hard line and pressure them into choosing one sport.

It even happens internally in the GAA between hurling & football. I'd like to hear a Kilkenny minor hurler tell his manager that he can't come training because he has a gaelic football match..!!!!

You also mentioned that "some GAA trainers look down on soccer". Again - this is true and is wrong - Sport is sport and no sport should be looked down on. But it is most certainly not unique to the GAA. IMO, there is an awful lot more snobbery in Ireland towards the GAA, than there is coming from it.

Indeed.

John Muldoon & Thomas O'Leary won All-Ireland minor medals in 2001 & 2001 (O'Leary captained Cork) before being forced to give up hurling due to their professional contracts.

Kevin Moran was allowed to play for Dublin while at Manchester Utd, until he came back from an All Ireland championship match with several injuries (iirc a bad gash on the head, hamstring and arm injuries).

Vinnie Flaherty played for Galway Utd & Galway senior footballers in the 90s (at the same time).
Ja Fallon played for Galweigans in the 90s, before he won the All-Ireland football in '98

Dave Barry of Cork played for Cork footballers and Cork city - scoring the first goal against Bayern Munich in a Uefa Cup tie, and later in the first rounds of the Champions league against Galatasary (in Turkey).

On the flip side, a fair few former professionals resume playing hurling and football after their professional careers end.

And since the school thing is coming up, I'm from a hurling area (the joke is that if a football appears in the parish, the welcome it gets is a knife). We played soccer at lunch (because the yard was tar and we wouldn't use the hurls on it) and everyone that wanted to played hurling & football. We organised football leagues for the spring, and even baseball in the summer.

We entered whatever competition we could muster the numbers for (i.e. a team and 2/3 subs) in both football & hurling, but we (the kids) had no real interest in playing soccer because it was seen as a bit of fun and not to be taken seriously (20 years later the FAI have repeatedly proved us right).

randd1

Did Keith Wood play hurling underage for Clare?

nice_guy80

i've heard of plenty of young players being told by their rugby club or rugby development squad provincial manager to give up playing GAA.

same with soccer - kids who could make a top schoolboy soccer club being told to give up playing GAA

antoobrien

nice_guy80 wrote: »

i've heard of plenty of young players being told by their rugby club or rugby development squad provincial manager to give up playing GAA.

same with soccer - kids who could make a top schoolboy soccer club being told to give up playing GAA

We had one 18 year old, who was a handy wing back, tell us he was getting £50 a game off the local soccer club, match it and he'll play hurling as well. He was told where to go.

Clareman

randd1 wrote: »

Did Keith Wood play hurling underage for Clare?

Under 16, himself and Anthony Foley both did, in fact Foley played in a Junior B final last year.

Cill94

Alright I can put this to bed now.

He meant that the GAA HAS €127 million. Not all from funding, but also from profits made from games, contributions from GAA clubs, etc. He was highlighting how odd this is because the sport is not professional and therefore the players are not paid, in contrast to other sports' governing bodies whose participants can compete on international level and are payed, or even the sports that allow us to compete on an olympic level (e.g. boxing) but have significantly less spending money and worse facilities.

Studies show (do not ask me for a bloody reference, this is just his response) that, in the space of one generation, there has been a decline in participation in GAA sports and a massive rise in other sports, especially: swimming, running (including marathons and triathlons), football and rugby (particularly the phenomenon of tag rugby which has exploded recently because of the intergender aspect). This is another reason why he highlighted how it is odd that the GAA still has so much money.

And in response to the people having a go at me for saying how many Irish watch foreign football leagues: I was using that as an example of how popular football is in terms of fans, because I perceived the guy I responded to as saying that the disinterest people show in Irish club football represents the interest for football on a whole on the island. I did not mean that this justifies investing more in football.

I'd also just like to say that neither I nor my lecturer have any bias against GAA or are trying to have a cheap pop at it. It's not a sport I take an interest in and I fully admit that I know feck all about its sports or the org itself. I only asked the question because I was surprised by a statistic which I misinterpreted.

nice_guy80

Cill94 wrote: »

Alright I can put this to bed now.

He meant that the GAA HAS €127 million. Not all from funding, but also from profits made from games, contributions from GAA clubs, etc. He was highlighting how odd this is because the sport is not professional and therefore the players are not paid, in contrast to other sports' governing bodies who compete on international/olympic level but have significantly less spending money and worse facilities.

Studies show (do not ask me for a bloody reference, this is just his response) that, in the space of one generation, there has been a decline in participation in GAA sports and a massive rise in other sports, especially: swimming, running (including marathons and triathlons), football and rugby (particularly the phenomenon of tag rugby which has exploded recently because of the intergender aspect)

And in response to the people having a go at me for saying how many Irish watch foreign football leagues: I was using that as an example of how popular football is in terms of fans, because I perceived the guy I responded to as saying that the disinterest people show in Irish club football represents the interest for football on a whole on the island. I did not mean that this justifies investing more in football.

I'd also just like to say that neither I nor my lecturer have any bias against GAA or are trying to have a cheap pop at it. It's not a sport I take an interest in and I fully admit that I know feck all about its sports or the org itself. I only asked the question because I was surprised by a statistic which I misinterpreted.

those studies may be right, but were any studies actually done on sports participation years ago?
many of those sports didn't really exist 'years ago' - tag rugby, triathlon (there were no clubs).
And I think its great that there is a huge range of sports for kids and adults to try out. I don't consider any of them any better or worse than the GAA.

I would agree that while the GAA has lost some ground, it has gained huge ground in terms of the penetration into Dublin (especially in hurling), coaching in schools across the country and facilities. In other counties - eg Mayo, Armagh there are now hurling clubs in areas that have not played hurling in 50 years, or in many cases, ever. Handball is making a comeback. And Ladies Gaelic is still growing.

The GAA is very weak on recreational games for people - because most clubs want to compete and win something. its the nature of the organisation. GAA clubs can also suffer from too much training and not enough games for kids and adults. but that is more the fault of county boards and poor fixtures planning.
the other area the GAA is a bit reckless in is the provision of stadiums and playing grounds. too many large stadiums have been developed instead of putting the money into floodlit all weather pitches that could be used all year round by multiple clubs/schools/county teams for various competitions

I think you should do a LOT more reading and research into the GAA before coming onto a GAA forum and throwing around crazy figures.

Davin Stand

If your lecturer genuinely believes that the GAA has 127 million euro he knows very little about the subject he is talking about. Ask him to tell you what Bank this money is kept in. I don't know what college you are attending, but if all the lecturers are of the same standard as this guy you won't get much of an education there.