“WHERE’S GAELIC FOOTBALL after this weekend?”
That was the question posed by GAA journalist Declan Bogue on a podcast for subscribers to The 42 after a set of quarter-finals which failed to excite.
“I would say apart from the first half of Mayo-Dublin, and the drama of the penalty shootout (between Armagh and Monghan) I think it was pretty poor stuff,” said Fintan O’Toole of The 42.
He added: “There’s going to have a be a serious look at a couple of rule tweaks that people have been suggesting, perhaps you have to keep three players inside the 45 at all times or another one I’ve seen suggested is that if the ball goes inside the 65 that basically you can’t come back outside it then.
“This weekend has kind of solidified the argument that there is going to have to be something. I know they are trialing some in the fresher football games this autumn, I’m not sure those are going to be the solution to the problem.”
Bogue said a deeper conversation about the game’s health should not be postponed in the event of a compelling All-Ireland final.
“What normally happens around this time of year is a few good games rescue our greater sort of malaise, why we’re all wailing and gnashing about the state of Gaelic football. Des (Cahill on RTÉ Radio 1) said as Éamonn Fitzmaurice made the point, let’s record what’s annoying us, what the problem is right now so we can come back and revisit it.
“But I don’t know if we’re going to see that . . . An All-Ireland final could be a brilliant game but let’s not have it save the season because there’s the other side of this.
“I’m not sure of the other side of this: that coaches will evolve this, that the game will evolve, coaches will find a way around this, it will naturally happen . . .
“There was a column in the Irish Times by Jim McGuinness last week saying, ‘Possession football, this is an awful thing’, as if he was just casually walking past and had nothing to do with this whatsoever.
“I have no faith in coaches to evolve the game anymore. I think if anything that this kind of style which an awful lot are playing, I think coaches kind of like it because it gives them more and more control.
“Then when they review games they can say, ‘Well you know there was a handpass that went astray’. It can completely strip them and absolve them of any responsibility in games and the outcome of them.
“So I wouldn’t exactly be hanging my hat on coaches to save Gaelic football. Definitely a couple of rule changes, there will be trials required, but in general, there’s no point saying otherwise, we’re not in a fantastically healthy spot right now with it.”
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