Changes in the GAA - super thread

I stand corrected so, I thought there were 3,the A,B and C options.

That's a horse of a different colour so, if that's the case.....my own fault for not reading up on it properly so, but the info on the proposals is scant enough.

Well in a sense there are actually four options, in that if both reform proposals are defeated I believe the congress will then have to decide whether to retain the super 8s or revert to a straight back door system.

But yes there are two actual reform proposals, A and B. And apparently B (league as championship) is the one gaining traction.

That Sindo article says they 'may' be jettisoned

Just looking at the last 11 (normal) seasons again.

Consider the following

With Option B places 6, 7 and 8 in Div 1 play no further part in the championship after the league stages.

2nd and 3rd in Div 2 play off against 1st and 1st in Div 3 and Div 4 for a QF place.

Now based on a well used line that's thrown out there that Div 3 and Div 4 teams rarely beat teams in the divisions higher than them in the championship, one would have to assume that the Div 2 teams would more often than not come out on top in the playoff v Div 3 and 4.

So essentially the 6th place team in Div 1 is yielding a place in the QF to the 3rd pace team in Div 2.

Now based on that, between 2009 and 2019 taking the championship exit point of both the Div 1 6th place team and the Div 2 3rd place team the following was the case.

On only two of eleven occasions did the Div 2 third pace team fare better than the Div 1 6th place team in the ensuing championship.

On two occasions they both finished the championship at the same level.

And on 7 occasions the 6th placed Div 1 team fared better than the 3rd placed Div 2 team.

It's stupid and will not pass.

2009

Dublin (QF) yield to Kildare (QF)

2010

Monaghan (rd4) yield to Donegal (rd1)

2011

Armagh (rd3) yield to Derry (rd4)

2012

Donegal (Winners) yield to Galway (rd2)

2013

Kerry (SF) yield to Laois (Rd4)

2014

Kerry (winners) yield to Meath (Rd4)

2015

Kerry (Final) yield to Meath (Rd2)

2016

Monaghan (Rd2) yield to Galway (QF)

2017

Tyrone (SF) yield to Meath (Rd3)

2018

Mayo (Rd2) yield to Clare (Rd2)

2019

Monaghan (Rd2) yield to Fermanagh (Rd1)

At the last numbers of Congress it was 66% needed for any motion to pass on the 23rd its down to 60%.

For those that think neither proposal will get voted in its worth pointing out the daftness of a group stage for the last 8 of All-Ireland championship got 76% of the vote and they refused to remove Dublins two games in Croke Park in year 2.

IMO they should go with the status quo and come back another year with the flaws in proposal B ironed out.

Ok, I'll throw this at you

In the 11 seasons between 2009 and 2019 here are the gaps between the 5th placed Div 1 team and the 6th place Div 1 team.

Essentially the gap between getting further in the championship or giving up a place for the sake of the 11th, 17th or 25th place team in Ireland.

2009 -1pt

2010 - 2pts (actually the bottom 3 all finished on the same amount of points)

2011 - 1pt

2012 - scoring difference of 6.

2013 - scoring difference of 13

2014 - 2pts

2015 - scoring difference of 8

2016 - scoring difference of 2

2017 - 1pt

2018 - 1pt

2019 - 4pts (huge in the grand scheme of things)

So in summary on only three occasions was the difference between 5th and 6th a single win or greater.

And on some occasions it came down to scoring difference.

The reality is that a 7 game league, with an unbalanced home and away schedule and two points for a win is way to small a sample size to be the determinate of who finishes their season early.

No matter how serious teams start taking the 7 games in the new structure that is not going to change.

"Who finishes their season early"

Every team is guaranteed 7 games in this new championship format.

The previous system or systems we had meant that only the elite went deep into the summer and everyone else had one or two games.

Proposal b gives every team a standard amount of games in the championship and it let's teams develop and build.

It's fair to everyone not just the Kerrys and Dublins and Tyrones.

I don't care how tight the margins between team 5 and the rest are in division 1, if you are not in the top five after 7 championship games you deserve to be gone.

6, 7 and 8 are getting what they deserve and that is relegation for 7 and 8 and out of the championship for 6.

I would concede that maybe you could tweak it to have 6 teams from div 1 going through and reduce it to 2 teams in division 2 but other than that this proposal b is almost perfect and it's streets ahead of any other alternative that's been mooted.

Usually in Div. 1 you get one team that is out of it's depth, one that struggles and after that it's a few teams that are fairly equal on any given year.

And making the league the championship and "more important" is not going to change that, you are going to get a team in 6th place that could equally have gone deep in the championship, had they finished 5th.

And they may have only missed on on 5th by a single loss, or less. And that loss could have come in one of their four away games, where as the team in 5th could have had three away games.

I think it's a great idea overall, but the loss of the 6th place team in Div 1 is far too unforgiving.

I'd expect a lot more debate about it in the week leading up the vote.

I'd expect only the latter stages games to be crucial matches and theyll likely be the matches that will attract the biggest attendances.

No chance you say, I'd give them a better chance that 2nd, 3rd in Div 2 or Div 3, 4 winners of winning the AI if all had the equal chance.

As for the minnows how is proposal B great for them? Such a format will not close the gap between the has and has nots.

Tyrone, Kerry, Dublin, Mayo - your All Ireland winner will come from one of those. Donegal, Monaghan, Galway have been huffing and puffing but are a bit off the top four. Let Donegal Monaghan and Armagh slog it out for fifth spot it will make for some entertainment

Galway will be in div 2 so they should be OK. I dont see any major big names suffering because of the new system. The four big boys will make it their business to be in the top five and let the pretenders get in there if their good enough.

Meanwhile let the rest of the teams in the country have 7 meaningful games in the premium competition and let them build and progress if they can.

There is an appetite for football in all counties its not all about the Kerrys, Dublins and Tyrones.

I'd put decent money on your top 4 of Tyrone, Mayo, Dublin, Kerry to reach the AI semi finals again with a status quo format next year. With proposal B there is a strong possibility that at least one of those 4 will not even reach the All-Ireland quarter finals as a group format with three games at home and 4 away could prove to be telling and 5th and 6th placed teams in Div 1 might by separate on scoring difference. That type of format might be acceptable for the NFL but to decide the championship faith of a county I think not.

I don't agree with your view that Every round of this league will be crucial as they simply won't especially in Div 3,4 and Kildare in Div 1 could be relegated with a few games to spare and you could get a situation in Div 2 whereby a team can't get relegated or finish in the top 3 come round 7, hardly crucial stuff.

People are seriously concerned that 1 of the top 6 won't make the the knockout stages of the championship even though they will be given 7 games to show that they are good enough to do so and because of this they argue this proposal is fatally flawed.

But they have no bother returning to the old system where ritual drubbings are handed out to Leitrim, Sligo, Clare, Waterford, Antrim and every Leinster team that play Dublin in outdated Provincial Championships. That is elitism at its finest.

The provincial championships barely deserve to be kept as pre season competitions, a system that has 12 teams in one group, 9 in another, 6 in another and 5 in the other is flawed and prehistoric.

No amount of format changes are going to make any huge difference to the gap between the top teams and the rest; coaching structures and funding are the only way to do that IMO

7 games to show in the group that contains the top 10 teams (can make an argument who's 7th,8th best Armagh, Kildare or last years Div 1 teams Galway, Roscommon)

Under proposal B five of the ten counties qualifying for the championship series are lower-ranked than several who are eliminated and the two teams that get relegated from Div 1 next year will have a better chance of reaching All-Ireland series the following season.

As for ritual drubbings what do you think will happen if a Div 3,4 winners ends up facing a top 4 team in All Ireland quarter final?

Provincial championships hadn't groups they were knock out up until 2001 and the last two years. The pre season competition under proposal B will be a group format and played in the spring, that's basically the FBD, O Bryne retained than Provincial championships.