What if GAA was played world wide?

bauney · 12-10-2019 7:50am #1

An odd conversation that mightn't even take off but here goes.
If Gaelic football was played world wide sport for 100 years ( like soccer or rugby) how much better would the standards be? Even if just played up to amature levels.

I presume our senior intercounty level wouldn't be the best. I would imagine we would see a very different approach to different aspects. Imagine individual players like Cristiano Ronaldo or Messi or Maradona and what they could show e.g scoring goals from next to impossible situations that we would not dare see today. Imagine the Spanish players (xavi,inesta,) who play keep ball, the Ajax total football team of the 70s, Brazilian flair. Our GAA world had never been exposed to these and has never evolved too dramatically ( apart from domestic change down through the years).

Just an odd thought.

bmcc10 · 12-10-2019 8:02am

bauney wrote: »

Just an odd thought.

You can say that again

RoversCeltic · 12-10-2019 8:02am

We would be terrible

Afl players play gas for a few weeks and are much better than gas players

The J Stands for Jay · 12-10-2019 8:32am

The tactics in use would be much better. Having more people playing and thinking about the game would lead to the trying of new things.

Road-Hog · 12-10-2019 8:40am

Just look at how good our ‘brexit’ friends have become at the ‘saw-ker’......it’s the home of ‘football’ they claim to have invented it etc.....didn’t their World Cup manager say after they were dumped out of 1970 cup that he wasn’t staying on for rest of the tournament as ‘he had nothing to learn’.....?

Davys Fits · 12-10-2019 10:12am

The first thing that need to happen if you think GAA was to be played internationally is a set of rules that are understood and implemented. We have an Irish way of covering over the grey areas regarding the tackle in both codes, number of steps and legal hand passes. Alot of foreigners like wacthing hurling but admit there must be alot of rules they dont understand. Truth is theres a alot of rules we dont understand ourselves.

ArmaniJeanss · 12-10-2019 9:37pm

bauney wrote: »

An odd conversation that mightn't even take off but here goes.
If Gaelic football was played world wide sport for 100 years ( like soccer or rugby) how much better would the standards be? Even if just played up to amature levels.

I presume our senior intercounty level wouldn't be the best. I would imagine we would see a very different approach to different aspects. Imagine individual players like Cristiano Ronaldo or Messi or Maradona and what they could show e.g scoring goals from next to impossible situations that we would not dare see today. Imagine the Spanish players (xavi,inesta,) who play keep ball, the Ajax total football team of the 70s, Brazilian flair. Our GAA world had never been exposed to these and has never evolved too dramatically ( apart from domestic change down through the years).

Presumably it would be professional in some of those other countries, and in order to compete we would have had to go professional ourselves in some small way.
So there probably wouldn't be the 'senior intercounty' that we know, instead we'd either play at provincial level or with a small number of super-clubs.

Also key would be that it almost certainly wouldn't be administered from Croke Pk by just Irish people, there'd be a FIFA/World Rugby type body in charge. So the rules/structures etc would have developed very differently.

PTH2009 · 12-10-2019 9:47pm

American accents in high class sets discussing 'Murphys tactics and comparing them to the great Brian Cody"

It would be completely different

bauney · 12-10-2019 10:04pm

Thanks replies this far but my intention here was what would the new skills/tactical differences be? E.g goal keeper positioning, keeping possession, movement, shot selection/positioning, solo dummies, kick/hand passes (as we know from Aussie rules, difference do exist) etc...
Reason i ask this is that for decades top athlete's used to perform the high jump in a way the seemed odd before the Fosbury Flop was engineered. I am sure there are skills/techniques that us GAA people are using that could be much improved.

Bonniedog · 13-10-2019 2:41am

RoversCeltic wrote: »

We would be terrible

Afl players play gas for a few weeks and are much better than gas players

You could train monkeys to play that sh1te game you obviously follow.

They do in fact. Good luck now and enjoy your next 0 - 0

MPFGLB · 13-10-2019 2:55am

I'm not sure I could stomach Kerry after 4 all worlds in a row ...they are bad enough as they are already

freshpopcorn · 13-10-2019 3:07am

Azerbaijan would pumps loads of money into it.

Elemonator · 13-10-2019 3:09am

It’d be ruined by sponsorship.

Realt Dearg Sec · 13-10-2019 3:18am

freshpopcorn wrote: »

Azerbaijan would pumps loads of money into it.

Yeah but as we know that would be totally unrelated to any success they might have.

Edgware · 13-10-2019 7:06pm

Realt Dearg Sec wrote: »

Yeah but as we know that would be totally unrelated to any success they might have.

Ah but who would be the most successful manager? Eoin O Duffy or Hermann Goering?

DJIMI TRARORE · 13-10-2019 7:29pm

Sky would throw millions at it and people would be in uproar about having to pay for it and it still be poor.............. Oh wait

charlie14 · 13-10-2019 9:54pm

bauney wrote: »

An odd conversation that mightn't even take off but here goes.
If Gaelic football was played world wide sport for 100 years ( like soccer or rugby) how much better would the standards be? Even if just played up to amature levels.

I presume our senior intercounty level wouldn't be the best. I would imagine we would see a very different approach to different aspects. Imagine individual players like Cristiano Ronaldo or Messi or Maradona and what they could show e.g scoring goals from next to impossible situations that we would not dare see today. Imagine the Spanish players (xavi,inesta,) who play keep ball, the Ajax total football team of the 70s, Brazilian flair. Our GAA world had never been exposed to these and has never evolved too dramatically ( apart from domestic change down through the years).

Just an odd thought.

If it was being played world wide at amateur level I doubt the likes of Messi, Ronaldo or Maradona or any of the others you mention would have been playing for long, If at all.
I cannot see either that their has been any more dramatic evolution in soccer than in GAA football.
GAA football and soccer are two completely different sports with completely different skill set requirements. If there is one position that is comparable it is goalkeeper. In that Stephen Cluxton for me at least is as good or better than any soccer keeper out there at present.

While some of those professional players you have mentioned have scored spectacular goals in their own sport.
So have GAA players in high stakes games.

In recent years alone for me two stand out, Owen Mulligan selling the whole Dublin defense a pup to score and Peter Canavan`s against Kerry to win Tyrone`s first senior AI.
Those are only two goal scoring examples. In point taking, fielding and defending there are countless others imo that in their execution of the skill-set required are on a par with any in professional sports

tritium · 16-10-2019 11:55am

Hard to know tbh. If you look at the compromise rules games it might give some inkling if one possible direction for football with an outside influence. On the other hand the current dublin team play a game that’s in many ways quite removed from the traditional one and perhaps that might be the direction things went. In either model the levels of athleticism would be very high, as well as a lot of skill at the top level given a global influence. One thing that would be likely in a global game is the traditionalists would be less able to push through rules changes relatively quickly that penalize innovative teams, which with a range of cultures bringing their own style of play would probably make for a wider variety of tactics.

LoughNeagh2017 · 18-10-2019 7:25pm

Of course I will be viewed as racist for saying this but African countries or countries that have a high black population would be better at Gaelic games, their body types are better at sport in general. 5'6 manlets like me never really had a chance. When was the last good manlet player? Johnny McGurk in early 90s?

What if GAA was played world wide?

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