Football Championship 2026 (Mod Note in OP)

The change in format has not made much difference to who qualified into the the last 12. 10 are the same, newcomers this year Mayo and Westmeath. Losing out from last year Cavan and Down.

Tyrone is the only one who made the last 8 directly both years. Last years Semi Finals if people remember were Donegal v Meath and Tyrone v Kerry.

I don't think there's a need to do anything in relation to the provincial winners - doing so introduces too many restrictions for the 2nd round draw imo

The previous format lasted 3 years, until the grumblings mostly about dead rubbers and lack of jeopardy saw it abandoned. Harking back to that format as some sort of model for progress now seems a bit odd. Especially from people who moaned about it when it was in place. I expect the 92% who approved the new format at Congress, knew what they were voting for.

The talk about home draws for Provincial winners is just talk. As is the talk about replays of Provincial Finals instead of penalties, and moving AI Finals to August. It will need another Special Congress to mandate those things.

https://www.rte.ie/sport/football/2025/0222/1498260-hurling-handpass-reform-rejected-at-gaa-congress/

"The All-Ireland SFC group phase, in place since 2023, had been widely criticised for a lack of perceived jeopardy, with three out of four teams allowed progress to the knockout phase."

Three tosses of a coin, three heads. This is the only stage of the competition where it is the luck of the draw, and it is a maximum of 3 games for any county. No need to invent ways to make it complicated, which some people want by trying to favour Provincial champions.

The Provinces themselves in their competitions don't worry too much about home/away. Westmeath played all their four Leinster games outside of Westmeath.

What happens if two provincial winners are drawn against each other in round 2 / 3?

That was my point - your proposal introduces additional restrictions on who can play whom when there's no real need to IMO

I expect that the Westmeath top brass are secretly relieved that they are not drawn at home. They would not have been able to resist the local "Mullingar or nowhere" clamour. They got to play in a good venue in Galway, and now the same in Clones. Mullingar would be packed like it was for Cavan, and thousands would miss out because of the capacity there. Having a Provincial champions must get a home draw edict, would not be ideal in that scenario.

There's a bit of hurling in Westmeath as well.