PARAIC DUFFY HAS denied that last August’s American football game in Croke Park – which resulted in the All-Ireland semi-final replay between Kerry and Mayo being switched to the Gaelic Grounds – ‘was part of a simple money-making exercise’.
The GAA Director-General addresses the issue in his report which was launched today in Croke Park but does admit that the GAA ‘took a risk that backfired on us’ in their scheduling of the college game.
Duffy describes how the decision ‘was greeted with indignation of many supporters – and especially by supporters of Mayo – and embroiled the association in a major controversy’.
“The strategy of bringing an American football game to Croke Park arose from the necessity to widen our funding base,” outlines Duffy.
“It is a financial fact of life for the association that it must put Croke Park to use in the necessity to increase our funding base. I utterly refute the claim that the American football game was part of a simple money-making exercise for the sake of pure financial gain.
“We simply don’t think that way, we think only in terms of generating income that will go back out to our clubs and counties. I have to acknowledge that we took a risk that backfired on us, a consequence of what proved to be an over-optimistic assessment of the unlikelihood of a replay.
“A decision made in the best interests of the association ended up causing offence to supporters, an outcome that I very much regret.”
Duffy points out GAA development projects at Casement Park, Páirc Uí Chaoimh, Ruislip and the National Sports Campus at Abbottstown as examples of where they invest funds. He accepts there are lessons to be learned from the episode.
“I fully accept that some people cannot get beyond the emotional point that All-Ireland semi-finals should be played in Croke Park, and it may be that Limerick was a once-off event. It should not offend anyone to point out that there was, ultimately, near-unanimous praise for the manner of the staging of the replay in the Gaelic Grounds.
“For the future, we should now allow this controversy to restrict our efforts to stage big events in Croke Park, including American football games. For our part, we have been reminded that certain traditions are very dear to our supporters.”
