Why wont die hard GAA fans admit football these days is muck?

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120321214#Comment_120321214

They lashed it up the field back say 40 years ago but 20 years ago that didnt happen, players picked out team mates with lovely foot passes or ran with the ball, now its all so slow and its not what football should be in my opinion. I honestly cant see how anyone thinks its in a healthy state right now.

farmingquestion

Agree OP.

The problem is that the GAA are far too slow to change the rules to keep the game attractive.

Teams and coaches obviously perfect the game based on the current rules...this is the same for any sport. Ireland rugby team...they introduced the "choke tackle". They identified a law of the game that if a player was held up, a maul could be formed which they could just kill the ball and win a scrum put in. The IRB quickly changed the laws as it was an effective move but it killed the entertainment value of the game, so they brought in the rule that if a knee touched the ground it was classed a tackle and players had to release.

The GAA need to bring in rules that prevent this boring handpassing across the 45s over and over again.

Maybe a rule like if you cross the 45 you can't come back or preventing the number of defenders in ones own half.

WesternZulu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322326#Comment_120322326

They really didn't. That's a common thought but if you look at old games from even the 1990s it's all pretty much hit and hope. Very little good skillful foot passing.

I wouldn't agree that it was better to watch at all. A lot of it looked like unskilful hoofing it up the field.

The old games from the 60's, 70's and 80's are even worse again.

The main problem with football is the lack of a defined and effective tackle. It's too difficult to dispossess the player in possession compared to most, if not all, ball sports.

Most sports are not great to watch as a neutral. However I firmly believe that a good game of football is better than any sport. It's near perfection!

Better than the sacred hurling anyway where lads can score points from midfield. Hurling fans can go on about how skillful it is but by all accounts when you can score regularly and easily from that range it devalues the sport.

keeponhurling

You look at games like Derry v Dublin, and although at times the teams had 15 men inside their own 45, there were still 25 scores in the game.

A score less then every 3 minutes.

thomas 123

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120320633#Comment_120320633

Soccer is excellent when your watching top teams, the skill on show is unreal. Rugby is also very good. American football would be great also if it wasn't mostly ads.

Don't get me wrong, soccer can be drab, boring and petty much of the time, but the chance of that moment of magic makes me watch the odd game as a neutral.

farmingquestion

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322468#Comment_120322468

On the defined tackle part, GAA could easily improve this and make tackling more rewarding by enforcing the 4 steps rule.

Have a look at this goal last year by Armagh, I counted 16 steps total with one hop.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeSCPWh9S9c

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322468#Comment_120322468

I played Gaelic football from say 92 to 2012, If I kicked the ball up the field, it was trying to pick a team mate out, it wasnt kick and hope at all. So if I was doing that, are you saying county footballers in those years were kicking and hoping?

TagoMago

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322326#Comment_120322326

The late 90s/early 00s does stick out as a period where some of the finer points of gaelic football were best exhibited, coming after the era or hoofing the ball into the vicinity of your best ball winner and hoping he wins his duel, and the zonal marking/puke football that came after.

The incredible play of Maurice Fitzgerald, Padraig Joyce, Ciaran McDonald & others and some of the battles they had with opposing defenders are still so iconic to this day. Saying that, the there were plenty of counties without this calibre of player and the no shortage of low scoring, poor quality games, particularly around this time of year. Not exactly worse than today's bad games where you have 30 well conditioned athletes execute a defeinsive game plan to nullify each other, not much better either.

Billy Ocean

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120320633#Comment_120320633

I find Hurling and Rugby can be great to watch as a netural, football actually can be too, Armagh Mayo a few weeks ago was brilliant, funnily enough Armagh Kerry and Armagh Donegal the last 2 weekends were a desperate watch.

farmingquestion

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323178#Comment_120323178

Nothing sums up the modern game of football as much as goalkeepers coming forward to take 45s/frees

If you don't have a forward, whose job it is to score points, that can kick over a 45 from the ground more often than not, you're in big trouble.

Treble double

The Pro 14 leauge not sure if that's it's right title. (The leauge competition that the Irish provinces compete in, in rugby) I would consider being asked to watch too random teams in this competition as a form of torture.

If there was a leauge of Ireland match being televised, I would attempt to watch it, but 5 minutes would be all I'd tolerate.

I would say even a March leauge game of Gaelic Football which would be the equivalent of the above, would be more appealing.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323302#Comment_120323302

A league of Ireland game in person is a far better watch than most gaelic football league games.

Billy Ocean

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323302#Comment_120323302

Alot of it is personal taste too rather than matter of fact things, American football for example is very popular these days, personally i couldn't get into it at all.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323243#Comment_120323243

That is a very small element of the game. No one thing could be selected as summing up the modern game. It includes the short kick out, sometimes countered by a high press, sometimes not contested. The short passing game to retain possession until a scoring opportunity arises, facing a blanket defence. Nearly every player including the two keepers in one half of the field by times. Passes back to the keeper if deemed useful.

What summed up the old game was much simpler. Long kick outs for four midfielders to contest, and in turn to kick long. Forwards were there to score, and defenders were there to stop them. The rest of the team looked on from afar at these set contests.

But of course it is not as black and white as that, since there are still long kickouts, and high fielding is a skill which continues. The high ball into the goal area is still a tactic. And no doubt back in the day some defenders roved up the field, and some forwards helped out the defence at times. One thing which could be said about the new game, is that it must demand a higher fitness level to execute, compared to catch and kick.

WesternZulu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323125#Comment_120323125

I'm big into soccer too and agree that at the very top level in the Champions League it's an excellent watch from the knock out stages. However, most EPL games are very poor to watch from a neutrals perspective.

As for rugby being a good watch. For me it's painfully stop-start which becomes really obvious when you go to a live game. Anything below international standard is awful.

Treble double

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120323613#Comment_120323613

Ya that's my point all field sports at the top level where there is a lot at stake are compulsive viewing.

Coming out and calling a sport "muck" because you are not entertained watching random teams in a humdrum leauge competition is a stupid comment.

As I said back up this statement with an example of a field sport that is brilliant to watch at an equivalent level, before labelling one sport "muck"

I watched a bit of Aussie Rules and while it has some good elements it is very stop start and highly tactical. In fairness to that sport the tackle is defined.

American Football I know nothing about apart from watching Super bowl finals. The action comes in spurts from what I have seen and there is an awful lot of forced razzmatazz to fill the gaps. It is supposed to be a gamblers dream which like horse racing would explain a lot of its popularity.

Oscar Madison

I think personnally GAA in its totality is complete muck!

When you think of people being assaulted who give up their time

to officiate & I am well aware that this happens in other sports also but

then the carry on of what should be an ambassador for the sport!

GAA needs to be run professionally without the parish pump politics!

Fr Tod Umptious

It all depends OP on what you want to call a "die hard GAA fan".

Listen to Radio Kerry anytime they are talking about football and all you have are these guys from the 80s complaining about how numbers on backs of jerseys don't seem to matter anymore, or how keepers come up to take frees, or how Armagh are using Ethan Rafferty, etc

They think the game was better when all you had were individual battles and let the best man win that individual battle.

But things have changed, it's been 20 years since the swarm defence, the infamous "puke football" which Spillane later apologized about calling it.

It been 20 years of possession football, keepers coming up to take frees, blanket defenses etc.

For a die hard GAA fan under 30 this is the football they have grown up with.

And yet the game is still popular, the sky has not fallen is as many predicted.

I watched four games on TV this weekend, two of which as a complete neutral, and I enjoyed them all for different reasons.

Ethan Rafferty playing the way he does is great to watch.

The hard running fast movement play is great to watch.

The hard physical challenges that force turnovers are great to watch.

And counter attacks at speed from those turnovers are great to watch.

People always complain that football is dying, or is dead if they continue to do x, y and z, but it's not, it's still very much alive.

Treble double

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120324130#Comment_120324130

It's more than alive it's thriving, I haven't the TV viewing figures for the latter round of the championships but they are bigger than ever.

I remember being at an inter county championship game in the late 80s as a child and listening to adults talking after saying the standard was brutal and the game was finished. Here we are going on 40 years later and the same doom mongers are in full voice, but the evidence seems to be to the contrary.

tastyt

Football can be boring if it’s two poor teams or one very negative team , but so can soccer and rugby . The difference is at least supporters of these sports can just come out and say when a match or season is shite

But god forbid anyone say that about a hurling match , all you get is the same bullshit “ warriors , magicians , best game in the world “. Maybe football people should just ignore the bad stuff like the hurling cult and just pretend everything is wonderful all of the time

MickoMoore81

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120320880#Comment_120320880

...

shockframe

Football is great. League is miles ahead of Hurling this time of year.

Throw all 16 league games that were played at the weekend and it would compare favorably to 16 games in other sports I would imagine.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120324218#Comment_120324218

Football people do ignore the bad stuff as they are still going to watch it.

1373

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322326#Comment_120322326

Agreed , football is better when they use the foot , I'm glad I finished playing 10 years ago because I'd hate to be a busy fool running around going nowhere . Same with training, a thousand drills and no actual football being played , treating adult footballers as children and wondering why they act like children in matches

rightmove

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322213#Comment_120322213

doesnt mean you understand it

MacDanger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120322213#Comment_120322213

Is that why you walked away from it Jimmy? 😁

Davys Fits

Its mad and sad watching 29 players running from one end of the field to the other in a stampede when a turnover happens in Gaelic football. My guess is that there are many defenders in football that never actually kick the ball in a full 70 minutes in the modern game. Would love to see the stats on that.

pgj2015

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120327218#Comment_120327218

I remember an inter county manager was supposed to have said to his players before a match with a stronger team, "if I see any of you kicking the ball in our half of the field, you are coming off" everyone thought it was crazy, little did we know what was coming. This was around 20 years ago.

id say though if Gaelic football turned into rugby, the die hard fans would still say its a great watch, deluded.

thinkabouit

The game is the game

I don’t think there’s a problem with the game itself, It’s the management & selectors

To play county lads & ladies have to have some serious talent & fitness

that talent gets destroyed by teams (you see it in other sports aswell)

Dublin & Kerry & Mayo have been the big teams for the past decade or so and done it by playing football mostly

if I was an inter county player I’d lose the will to live being asked to play a blanket defence as tactics against another blanket defence.

F that!

If managers actually showed some belief in their player’s and set them up to win rather than not lose imagine what the game would be like.

Davys Fits

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120327725#Comment_120327725

If the game allows it then its the game thats at fault. If soccer players could handpass the ball then managers would have them doing exactly that instead of trying to kick it.