End The Provincials

Groups of 4 with two to qualify could easily minimise dead rubbers by having scoring differnece instaed of H2H and having round 1 winners play each other in round 2

I actualy said '' Possibly not but I wouldn't rule it out either'' . Anyway it was more about the facile qualifier round than anything else.

It was a far better system. The complaints some counties have about not hurling in high summer could be rectified by the old qualifier system. It could give the entire Championship that room to breathe without interfering with the split season.

I think from the last few years the vibe seems to be if you lose 3 games between provincial and All Ireland or Tailteann, it should be knockout.

If Roscommon lose their Connacht opener, Round 1 and Round 2B - I don't think there can be many complaints.

You ask a good question. Being relegated from Division 1 and losing your provincial opener but still qualifying isn't under media scrutiny. If the league followed after provincial championships, it would come under media scrutiny.

Christ, why are some cohorts of GAA fans always so angry/ every system will have its pros and cons. i believe that the current in both hurling and football are the best we've ever had in terms of having that balance between (i) Plenty of Games (ii) Keeping Chamionship reasonably cut-throath (iii) Keeping provincials and thus giving counties something winnable. 4 of the 6 provincial competitions were followed by wild celebrations, as was the Joe McDonagh cup, essentially the third province in Hurling. I got a laugh above out of the "They only celebrated because they hadn't won it in ages" argument above about cork and Louth- that's the whole f-ing point.

In any case i wasn't keeping track of posters names but whoever thought he was funny above giving wrong names to cup competitions named after deceased GAA legends started this thread off on the worng foot and doesn't deserve to be replied to

I have to say there are few things in life that bore me as much as people suggesting alternatives to the provincial hurling championships. The whole point is that you love to beat your neighbours - who cares about beating a team 300km away.

The provincials could be played as a separate competition but I agree that its time for them to go in the interests of the the betterment of the competitions as a whole.

Playing the same teams, year in, year out is stale. There's no interest in the championship draw as everyone knows who they're getting the only difference is the date. The results are pretty much identical every year. You can pick the finalists and even the winners of everything bar Munster hurling and Ulster football every year and even then you'd be 99% sure who'd be in the final before it starts.

Provincials were fine when it took the guts of a day to get to and from a match on a bike but those days are long gone. The championship needs variety and at the moment its all very predictable until you get to the group stages.

I'm, guessing you're not a Galway man if you think beating Mayo is stale. Or Roscommon or sligo for that matter. And before you argue it gets stale if you're always losing to the same team looks at the scenes when Meath beat Dublin this year.