Dublins HQ funding for coaching under scrutiny

http://hoganstand.com/ArticleForm.aspx?ID=249923

Seems that Dublin are getting a whooping 47% of the funds from HQ on top of their lucrative sponsorship.

Galway are struggling for years with a debt on a training facility(which is knocking into other areas) while a county which is far too big for the modern era gets to use Croker and enjoys a disproportionate amount of funding.

Colt Knost

Its incredibly unfair.
No wonder they can employ so many games development officers.

Dots1982

Its a scandal but sure its been happening for 10+ years and no one seemed to care until Dublin starting winning multiple All Irelands.

I was saying in 2008 that Dublin's monopoly over the CC funds was a disaster waiting to happen for a competitive intercounty championship.

Cat's out of the bag now but its probably too late.

Dots1982

Its a scandal but sure its been happening for 10+ years and no one seemed to care until Dublin starting winning multiple All Irelands.

I was saying in 2008 that Dublin's monopoly over the CC funds was a disaster waiting to happen for a competitive intercounty championship.

Cat's out of the bag now but its probably too late.

nice_guy80

at least let the urban areas outside Dublin enjoy the same level of funding, if that what the argument is for higher funding - numbers of kids and schools.

eg
Athlone
Mullingar
Sligo
Galway City
Limerick
Ennis
Waterford
Dundalk
Drogheda

to name but a few

nice_guy80

at least let the urban areas outside Dublin enjoy the same level of funding, if that what the argument is for higher funding - numbers of kids and schools.

eg
Athlone
Mullingar
Sligo
Galway City
Limerick
Ennis
Waterford
Dundalk
Drogheda

to name but a few

PressRun

The GAA are more concerned about the bottom line than anything else. They pumped money into Dublin when they were going through a drought in order to make them more competitive under the idea that GAA can't flourish unless it flourishes in the capital and a competitive Dublin means a busier Croke Park on a more regular basis. Dublin have invested their money wisely and have made sure they've gotten the best from it to produce the best results possible. They've done absolutely nothing wrong there. But the GAA seem to have no long-term strategy for what was going to happen once they'd pushed Dublin GAA forward. What happens to the other counties in Leinster who don't have the funds or resources to match Dublin? Or indeed, what happens to the so-called weaker counties all across the other provinces? So, we're now in a situation where the Leinster championship is an utter write-off and I would imagine money is in danger of being lost if it hasn't been already. And now the GAA are interested in rolling things back. Absolutely no forethought was given to the long-term effects of this endeavour in the first instance, and again, it's all about the bottom line.

The day of great teams spontaneously emerging in the right place at the right time is slipping away. Funding is playing a bigger and bigger role in the development of great teams, as the GAA well knew when they started to put money into Dublin in the first place. There needs to be some attention given to the equitable distribution of funds alongside changes in championship structure in order to stop the ever growing gaps between the haves and the have-nots. I'm not expecting anything hugely radical though from the GAA.

corny

What exactly is this money used for?

Is it used to better coach youngsters or (as the name suggests) is it used to attract hearts and minds to the GAA in Dublin.

Its catch 22 if its the latter. If its the former it is very unfair.

Dots1982

corny wrote: »

What exactly is this money used for?

Is it used to better coach youngsters or (as the name suggests) is it used to attract hearts and minds to the GAA in Dublin.

Its catch 22 if its the latter. If its the former it is very unfair.

Don't really get your point but Games development funds are used to pay full time coaches, upgrade facilities, buy footballs, jerseys, gear, nets, goals.

All the usual stuff that would promote the game in the county.

cart man

nice_guy80 wrote: »

at least let the urban areas outside Dublin enjoy the same level of funding, if that what the argument is for higher funding - numbers of kids and schools.

eg
Athlone= 20,153 (population)
Mullingar = 20,103
Sligo = 19,452
Galway City = 75,530
Limerick = 57,106 (city)
Ennis = 25,360
Waterford = 46,732
Dundalk = 37,816
Drogheda = 30,393

Total = 332,645
Dublin = 1,270,603

I am not arguing any merits to the investment or whether it is justified or not but "urban" areas outside of Dublin are usually overestimated.

glack

cart man wrote: »

Total = 332,645
Dublin = 1,270,603

I am not arguing any merits to the investment or whether it is justified or not but "urban" areas outside of Dublin are usually overestimated.

Those figures above don't tell the true story on population. The population in the greater Drogheda area is over 70000 for example. The number above only covers the area that was formally within the Drogheda Council area before it was abolished and its boundary was well outdated and didn't account for the population explosion there too. The county boundaries confuse matters greatly there too. The Drogheda area population is bigger than Waterford city.

nice_guy80

If you include Monksland with Athlone there's over 30,000

nice_guy80

And look, there'll always be people who won't play GAA - rugby and soccer families

there needs to be a big investment in urban areas outside of Dublin

nice_guy80

And look, there'll always be people who won't play GAA - rugby and soccer families

there needs to be a big investment in urban areas outside of Dublin

The_Honeybadger

The original decision to award Dublin additional funding through the ISC and CC was well justified and has worked marvellously. The dubs were a shambles in the 00's and something had to be done to generate a bit of success and interest in the capital. As said above there doesn't appear to be a plan for the Leinster championship after this process, perhaps HQ didn't expect the funding to work so spectacularly. The Leinster championship is now a joke competition and the gap between Dublin and the rest is only growing. It would probably require a radical change in the championship structure to solve but I won't hold my breadth. There is very little incentive for good young players from the likes of Kildare or Meath to stick with football now, particularly if they show promise in rugby or soccer.

The focus shouldn't be on how to dismantle dublins clearly excellent system, but how to bring the others up. I suspect it would take a decade of heavy investment in the other counties to get any sort of a competitive Leinster championship again. The funds are not there for that unfortunately unless they pull the rug from under Dublin and start distributing the funding more equitably. It will never happen of course, as the dubs hold too much sway in the game and would go mental at the mere suggestion of any meaningful cut in their development funding.

Looking at it from an overall championship perspective I see Dublin winning at least 5 of the next 10 All Ireland's, with the other traditionally successful counties picking the rest off when Dublin have a bad day out. I don't see that as being too bad. The reality is that most sports are dominated by a handful of teams and having a wide open championship is just not realistic. The real issue is the provincial championships, and particularly the Leinster one.

CrabRevolution

glack wrote: »

Those figures above don't tell the true story on population. The population in the greater Drogheda area is over 70000 for example. The number above only covers the area that was formally within the Drogheda Council area before it was abolished and its boundary was well outdated and didn't account for the population explosion there too. The county boundaries confuse matters greatly there too. The Drogheda area population is bigger than Waterford city.

According to the census small area maps, the area immediately north and south of Drogheda is only 65'000. Since that figure includes Bettystown, Laytown, Julianstown, Stamullen, Termonfeckin, Tullyallen and Drogheda itself, your figure of 70'000 is well off the mark.

nice_guy80

CrabRevolution wrote: »

According to the census small area maps, the area immediately north and south of Drogheda is only 65'000. Since that figure includes Bettystown, Laytown, Julianstown, Stamullen, Termonfeckin, Tullyallen and Drogheda itself, your figure of 70'000 is well off the mark.

It's still more than in county Roscommon!

Paulzx

mickeyk wrote: »

The focus shouldn't be on how to dismantle dublins clearly excellent system, but how to bring the others up. .

Wholeheartedly agree. Funding is only part (an important part admittedly) of the package of generating succesfull teams and increasing player numbers. Counties outside of Dublin need to concentrate on getting a bigger slice of funding and overhauling how they run the games in their counties.

There should be an aspiration to catch up on Dublin..........not drag them back to a lower level. There's no doubt it's not going to be easy but it needs the right people running the show at county level

Dots1982

Paulzx wrote: »

There should be an aspiration to catch up on Dublin..........not drag them back to a lower level. There's no doubt it's not going to be easy but it needs the right people running the show at county level

How do you catch up on a county that has huge population advantages & huge commercial advantages?

All the GAA can do is cut their Games Development funding which they should do but that chances of this putting counties in the frame to compete with Dublin are slim.

That said Kildare are able to compete with Dublin at underage levels at most grades so there is hope there. A sliver of hope but at least its something although I'm not sure Kildare will ever have a proper winning mentality and have 2 of their best prospects in the AFL.

Meath and other Leinster counties are completely hopeless underage though.

Its fine saying most sports are dominated by 2 or 3 teams (NFL is an exception to this) but GAA has to be different. It has become a elitist sport and a fightback needs to occur.

bruschi

I'm not sure how any of these is new to anyone? For years Dublin has had a massive amount of paid full time coaches under the county board and clubs in comparison to other counties. At one stage it was near 150 coaches. Wexford as an example has 4 full time coaches in the county. By sheer weight of numbers, then it makes sense that the money spent would be vastly more than every other county and not far off double the country.

It's nothing new, but its also not right to have such a disporportionate number considering the volume of money already invested in Dublin.

And again, as if it has to be said, this isnt Dublins fault. The GAA are handing them the money and Dublin are using it extremely well and should be an example to others of how to use (a lot of) money well.

It's just a shame the GAA's generosity does not extent to other counties by the same margin.

Paulzx

Dots1982 wrote: »

How do you catch up on a county that has huge population advantages & huge commercial advantages?

All the GAA can do is cut their Games Development funding which they should do but that chances of this putting counties in the frame to compete with Dublin are slim.

That said Kildare are able to compete with Dublin at underage levels at most grades so there is hope there. A sliver of hope but at least its something although I'm not sure Kildare will ever have a proper winning mentality and have 2 of their best prospects in the AFL.

Meath and other Leinster counties are completely hopeless underage though.

Its fine saying most sports are dominated by 2 or 3 teams (NFL is an exception to this) but GAA has to be different. It has become a elitist sport and a fightback needs to occur.

Population advantage is always brought up. Obviously as the largest city in the country Dublin is always going to have that. However, it also had the same population advantage when Dublin couldn't win an All Ireland for years. So what changed? Funding........yes, but also a fundamental emphasis on how to use the funding and this can only be done with he right people creating the right plans.

The woes of former strong Leinster sides such as Meath and Kildare are constantly laid out in public. Yet the population of these counties has never been higher due to the natural population spread in the Leinster region. There are more people living in these counties than ever (much of them young) yet the standard of their inter county teams has consistantly dropped. I doubt very much if Kerrys population expanded at the rate it has in Meath and Kildare that they would disimprove their county team!!

Something is still fundamentally wrong in loads of counties and funding alone won't fix it although it would be a start

Dots1982

bruschi wrote: »

I'm not sure how any of these is new to anyone? For years Dublin has had a massive amount of paid full time coaches under the county board and clubs in comparison to other counties. At one stage it was near 150 coaches. Wexford as an example has 4 full time coaches in the county. By sheer weight of numbers, then it makes sense that the money spent would be vastly more than every other county and not far off double the country.

It's nothing new, but its also not right to have such a disporportionate number considering the volume of money already invested in Dublin.

And again, as if it has to be said, this isnt Dublins fault. The GAA are handing them the money and Dublin are using it extremely well and should be an example to others of how to use (a lot of) money well.

It's just a shame the GAA's generosity does not extent to other counties by the same margin.

I was aware of this going back years but not many people take an interest unless someone kicks up a fuss in newspapers, for whatever reason no one ever did and now I can't be sure if Dublin are so far ahead if they can ever be caught up on.

Hammer Archer

Paulzx wrote: »

The woes of former strong Leinster sides such as Meath and Kildare are constantly laid out in public. Yet the population of these counties has never been higher due to the natural population spread in the Leinster region. There are more people living in these counties than ever (much of them young) yet the standard of their inter county teams has consistantly dropped. I doubt very much if Kerrys population expanded at the rate it has in Meath and Kildare that they would disimprove their county team!!

The population increase in the likes of Meath and Kildare doesn't necessarily have the desired effect of increasing the quality of intercounty teams, mainly because a lot of the new arrivals in these counties are originally from Dublin and still live close enough to their parent clubs to continue playing with them. For example, Dublin player Darren Daly lives in Meath.

Also, GAA rules allow children to play with their parents' home clubs/counties. Again some examples are Mick Deegan who currently plays club football for Donaghmore/Ashbourne in Meath but togs out in Dublin colours. Shane Clayton used to play underage football for Ratoath yet is now with Ballyboden.
Even a simple walk around any of the larger towns in Meath or Kildare during the championship will show you that there are masses of young people who would have no intention of ever playing with the county they live in going by the amount of Dublin jerseys and flags around.

Dots1982

Hammer Archer wrote: »

The population increase in the likes of Meath and Kildare doesn't necessarily have the desired effect of increasing the quality of intercounty teams, mainly because a lot of the new arrivals in these counties are originally from Dublin and still live close enough to their parent clubs to continue playing with them. For example, Dublin player Darren Daly lives in Meath.

Also, GAA rules allow children to play with their parents' home clubs/counties. Again some examples are Mick Deegan who currently plays club football for Donaghmore/Ashbourne in Meath but togs out in Dublin colours. Shane Clayton used to play underage football for Ratoath yet is now with Ballyboden.
Even a simple walk around any of the larger towns in Meath or Kildare during the championship will show you that there are masses of young people who would have no intention of ever playing with the county they live in going by the amount of Dublin jerseys and flags around.

I think Niall Quinn's son plays for Eadestown in Kildare and was with the Dublin minors.

All the same I don't think it's that big of an issue in Kildare. Maybe more in Meath.

Laois' players transferring to Dublin clubs as about 4 have done is no help to Laois and makes you wonder about where the game is going.

Paulzx

Hammer Archer wrote: »

The population increase in the likes of Meath and Kildare doesn't necessarily have the desired effect of increasing the quality of intercounty teams, mainly because a lot of the new arrivals in these counties are originally from Dublin and still live close enough to their parent clubs to continue playing with them. For example, Dublin player Darren Daly lives in Meath.

Also, GAA rules allow children to play with their parents' home clubs/counties. Again some examples are Mick Deegan who currently plays club football for Donaghmore/Ashbourne in Meath but togs out in Dublin colours. Shane Clayton used to play underage football for Ratoath yet is now with Ballyboden.
Even a simple walk around any of the larger towns in Meath or Kildare during the championship will show you that there are masses of young people who would have no intention of ever playing with the county they live in going by the amount of Dublin jerseys and flags around.

The inverse is also true. Many Dubs who have moved to Meath and Kildare are involved with the local clubs and their kids play for them. I personally know plenty of Dubs living and involved in local gaa in Kildare.

They also need to target the kids of parents who have never had an involvement in gaa themselves. These parents have no gaa ties in Dublin and will automatcally stay local.

Either way the pool of possible players in these counties has never been bigger

Bonniedog

How any other counties have submitted the sort of plans that Dublin have in order to use the funding available?

Dublin didn't just say "oh, we'd like x amount of dollars, here's our bank account number."

You need to have structures and plans in place beforehand. I remember being at coaching courses here for kids teams and there were dozens of people on winter nights, and only person who was getting a few bob, and I doubt he was on overtime, was the GPO.

My local club has no paid coaches but has hundreds of kids out most nights of the week, even in the dead of winter.

Money is important for anything, but so is attitude. Don't mean to be smart, but I doubt very much that exists in any of the other urban areas mentioned, some of which hardly have a functioning GAA.

But I do agree that something needs to be done. Perhaps GAA should appoint coaches centrally to weaker counties? Traditionally strong counties like Wexford and Offaly should be funded to support any coaching plans they submit.

Not sure if anything can be done about sponsorship unfortunately as companies will naturally go to the teams they see as the biggest draws. Hard to see any level playing field there.

doc_17

Get loads of money from the GAA and all their games at home. Antrim got €47,000 compared to Dublin's €1,460,000.

The_Honeybadger

Dots1982 wrote: »

I was aware of this going back years but not many people take an interest unless someone kicks up a fuss in newspapers, for whatever reason no one ever did and now I can't be sure if Dublin are so far ahead if they can ever be caught up on.

I don't think they can be caught up to in leinster and they will continue to sweep all the other teams aside indefinitely. They won't dominate the all Ireland series in the same way though. Cork, Tyrone, mayo and others will be looking to improve in the coming years and Kerry will undoubtedly sneak in for a few 'soft' titles as well once their successful minor teams develop.

Edit. @Bonniedog it's not that other counties don't have plans and structures in place. Back on the 00s Dublin got awarded a special fund through the sports council for games development. It was approximately €1m a year on top of all of the other funding they were already getting, I can't remember the exact details. The funding was ring fenced for Dublin and no other county could apply for it so its not fair to say that other counties need to get the finger out and develop their own plans. Dublin got special treatment to get them out of the rut they were in and it has worked.

bruschi

Bonniedog wrote: »

How any other counties have submitted the sort of plans that Dublin have in order to use the funding available?

Dublin didn't just say "oh, we'd like x amount of dollars, here's our bank account number."

You need to have structures and plans in place beforehand. I remember being at coaching courses here for kids teams and there were dozens of people on winter nights, and only person who was getting a few bob, and I doubt he was on overtime, was the GPO.

My local club has no paid coaches but has hundreds of kids out most nights of the week, even in the dead of winter.

Money is important for anything, but so is attitude. Don't mean to be smart, but I doubt very much that exists in any of the other urban areas mentioned, some of which hardly have a functioning GAA.

But I do agree that something needs to be done. Perhaps GAA should appoint coaches centrally to weaker counties? Traditionally strong counties like Wexford and Offaly should be funded to support any coaching plans they submit.

Not sure if anything can be done about sponsorship unfortunately as companies will naturally go to the teams they see as the biggest draws. Hard to see any level playing field there.

I really hate this argument being brought up as if Dublin were the only ones who had a development plan and that is the reason they got the money. That they got up off their holes and drove on.

Pretty much every county has a development plan going back ten years, and pretty much every one of them had approached the GAA in a similar vein to Dublin. I've personally seen the one Wexford submitted and I also saw Longford Kilkenny and Louths amongst others overall plan that was made public (am assuming the submission was more detailed and not released publicly)

Even on Wexfords part, they made a complete balls up of the training ground centre and ended up being massively in debt as a result. Thereby the majority of money spent for the last 10 years or so was to plug the hole in the debt and turn things around. It is only in the last 3 years or so that they have started reinvesting properly in coaching and underage structures. And even at that, it is a mile behind similar counties, never mind Dublin. It has improved massively, but additional funding would make an unbelievable difference. Wexford have not received any additional funding or grants or special bail outs like some counties have got.

It is not a level playing field in general and the GAA also contribute to ensuring that there is no level playing field.

BonnieSituation

When you see what happens in Cork when they want to redevelop a stadium you have to wonder what others would be like with a hape of cash to hand.

In an ideal world, other counties would be asking Dublin how to use any cash they get or asking how they establish their plans in a coherent way. Of course a lot of counties are too proud to ask.

I'd look at Dublin, Mayo, Tyrone, Kilkenny, Donegal and Kerry counties to emulate in certain fashions like say, NZ are in rugby union. It's not an accident they ship players and coaches around the planet like they do.

BonnieSituation

When you see what happens in Cork when they want to redevelop a stadium you have to wonder what others would be like with a hape of cash to hand.

In an ideal world, other counties would be asking Dublin how to use any cash they get or asking how they establish their plans in a coherent way. Of course a lot of counties are too proud to ask.

I'd look at Dublin, Mayo, Tyrone, Kilkenny, Donegal and Kerry as counties to emulate in certain fashions like say, NZ are in rugby union. It's not an accident they ship players and coaches around the planet like they do.