THREE-TIME ALL-Ireland winner Conor Gormley says “it’s disappointing” there will be a vastly reduced number of provincial football games broadcast live on TV this summer.
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According to an Irish Times report on Tuesday, there will be just two Ulster SFC games shown live this season, down from seven last year. And the Irish Examiner reported yesterday that the Munster SFC final is expected to be the only football game televised live in the province.
The GAA’s latest broadcasting deal was signed before the introduction of the football Super 8s and the reformatting of the Munster and Leinster SHC competitions as round robins, meaning only 45 games will be broadcast live across both codes despite the increased number of games.
RTÉ and Sky Sports will show all 12 of the Super 8 games between them (six each), plus extra hurling games in the provinces. As a result, live coverage of the football provincial competitions will be severely hit.
“It’s disappointing, big time,” said former Tyrone defender Gormley. “You want to be at home on a Sunday, sit down, have your dinner, stick the TV on BBC or RTÉ and watch games.
“You want to watch your national game, whether it be in Croke Park, Clones, MacHale Park or Killarney, whatever it may be. You want to watch big games, massive games.
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“That’s something I would have done when I was playing: sit down, watch a game and see how does the Gooch (Colm Cooper) move, what foot he’s kicking with, what side of the pitch he’s coming in off. I’d have picked wee things up like that.
“In this day and age, that we can’t have multiple games shown – an absolutely amazing sport – and we can’t watch it on our TVs. It’s not really fair. I just can’t get my head around how we can’t sit and watch one of the best sports, probably the best sport in the world.
“Something that’s our own here in Ireland and we can’t watch it, we can’t watch the best players. It doesn’t seem fair to me. The powers that be and money, I suppose, is a big, big thing. It’s just unfortunate, you know.”
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Gormley, who works as a full-time underage coach for the Tyrone county board, believes it’s the youngsters who will be most affected by the move.
“It’s not helping our kids,” he added. “If a kid can’t watch a game, if you can’t go to Croke Park and watch Dublin vs Kildare or we can’t go down to watch Kerry vs Cork and it’s not on TV, how does that help our kids improve?
“They’re not watching the best players. They’re missing out on watching Paul Geaney, they’re missing out on watching David Moran. How does he play in midfield? How does he jump for the ball? How is he attacking the ball? Boys are missing out.”
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