GAA PRESIDENT JOHN Horan says it’s unavoidable that Cork’s football and hurling teams are playing on separate days in Croke Park this weekend.
The Rebels are in All-Ireland SFC Super 8s action on Saturday night against Dublin, while their hurlers travel to Jones’ Road to face Kilkenny in the All-Ireland SHC quarter-final on Sunday afternoon.
Cork supporters were unhappy that both games were not played on the same day, but Horan says it wasn’t an option.
“It would have been more desirable if you could put them together,” he said yesterday at the GAA All Ireland hurling series national launch.
“But when you talk about the Cork supporters, the Cork football supporter will be a different cohort to the Cork hurling supporter. The guy that bridges both, these things are unfortunate.
“It is positive from a Cork point of view that they are doing so well but you just can’t fit everything in. If you were trying to put three fixtures on a Sunday, where would you put a Dublin-Cork game? Are you going to put it on at 12pm to get them all in? That’s the unfortunate thing.
“There will always be an appetite to have a game on a Saturday night and a Dublin game is generally on a Saturday night. And for the hurling supporter, the double-header of the hurling on a Sunday does fit in well together. Just to split it would have been a lot more difficult.”
Laois boss Eddie Brennan and Westmeath’s Joe Quaid were both critical of the hurling schedule which saw them forced into All-Ireland preliminary quarter-final action a week after the Joe McDonagh Cup final.
Brennan described it as “almost like a little slap-down” to have such a short turnaround after playing the showpiece game of their primary competition.
While Horan had sympathy for them, he said the tight scheduling makes it difficult to change that.
“The whole difficulty in that is the whole timing factor,” he said.
“The Joe McDonagh, the whole concept behind that was to get it high profile and get the final played before the Leinster final. So you are going to run it off that bit earlier, and how far out are you stretching out the whole season?
“You have to have a certain bit of sympathy for them in that this is the third week in a row they will be playing. I know there is a certain momentum to that but there is a fatigue, and you could see that in the game the last day, the last 10 minutes, there was a number of Laois lads going down, cramping.
“It is just so difficult, the complexity of people going from Joe McDonagh to jumping back into the Liam MacCarthy competition that how do you run one off and move it on to the other?
“It is not easy, no more than the six-day turnaround was always very difficult for the provincial teams. We are conscious of them, not saying we always have the solution to them.”
It emerged yesterday that the capacity of Fitzgerald Stadium in Killarney was reduced from 38,000 to around 32,000 for Sunday’s Super 8s tie between Kerry and Mayo.
Horan said that decision was out of the GAA’s hands.
“Unfortunately, I wouldn’t know the exact specifics but such is the hosting of matches in these venues, everyone is very conscious of the health and safety issues. And health and safety rules are not governed by us, but they are rules we have to deal with.
“Even when you look at Newbridge, and see the matches in Newbridge, there is an awful lot of spare capacity in the ground but the real problem there is the figures called access and egress and you have to match them. That creates the problem.
“And the other aspect is that a curtain-raiser actually allows you to have a bigger crowd from an access point of view but egress is the problem that was there in Newbridge, when you could see very clearly open spaces and you would say why can’t they have an extra 2,000 in the ground.
“But look, we are governed by the rules of the land and that is where it ties in. It is not just a simplistic thing to say you could just put 38,000 people into that stadium, you have got the access, you have got the egress.”
The42 is on Instagram! Tap the button below on your phone to follow us!
Great game of football. Unfortunate mistake by Patton but what a joy to watch Murphy. This Dublin team will go down as the greatest ever and so could Murphy
@Shaun Gallagher: Murphy nowhere near greatest ever. Laughable.
@Jack Ronan: didn’t think it was funny but suppose everyone is different
Joe Brolly some dose, rte don’t make many good decisions but shafting him was spot on
@Ronny Phelan: he’s a joke, he’s become a Dublin fanatic rather than an analyst for the game. Donegal lead for 60 mins, they pegged back a 3 point deficit to a single score before the fulltime whistle went. If it went another 3 mins either side could have won it or end on a draw. Brollys acts as if we watched a Liverpool 5 nil trashing of city. Yes Dublin are good, yes they did 5 in a row, but bloody well analyse the game that was there. If monaghan beat mayo tomorrow their last 5 years performances won’t be mentioned.
@RJ: Yeah because they didnt win the last 5 all irelands and are a bunch of bottlers
@RJ: Why would anyone mention Monaghans last five years ?
Good game could have gone either way. Again time keeping inconsistencies, game stopped for nearly 2 and a half minutes for the Murphy Small sending off yet only an extra minute played.
@Gareth Keenan: refs can’t win when it comes to this.dubs cute out when the chips are down, you have to hand it to them.
@Fr Romeo sensini.: yeah definitely the GOAT.
@Fr Romeo sensini.: Refs can’t win? It’s a Flipping clock. Not a discretionary process. What a senseless comment. Over 2 mins stopped = 2 mins at least added. But I guess there was no need, Dublin had the lead
@RJ: you try doing it and dealing with 10 to 15 lads wrestling with each other at the same time.
John Small is some pantomime villain.
@Robb Stark: Oh no he isn’t
More cynical play to get Murphy sent off.
@raymond flynn: Murphy is no angel but Small is always at it.
@raymond flynn: didn’t see too many of the yahoo’s in blue running in to fight ter this evening!! But few weeks back they wer very tough trying too beat a few young Kerry players!!!
@raymond flynn: Murphy is well able to get himself sent off
@Yusufmc: grow up.
@Yusufmc: are you drunk?
@GrumpyAulFella: wish I was watching that throw ball! Thx god for hurling!!!
@Phil O Stine: what did he do to get himself sent off.
@Brian: watch the game
@Phil O Stine: he got man of the match. I guess you are 1 of those blinkered bitter supporters.
@Brian: he should have been sent off in first few minutes . He went in on Davy Byrne with his elbow. Do you are right the refs can’t do the job
To be fair the second yellow card John small received should have been a red card
@Conor Brick: To be fair, you’re talking shyte, Murphy started the handbags and dragged him to the ground. What’s he meant to do?
@Ciarán: To be fair the first yellow Murphy received should have been red
@Conor Brick: Every second yellow is a red bud ….
I suppose the refs are playing to the letter of the law but between the club final and these few league games, congress could be looking at bringing in a ladies football or rugby style clock to reduce the amount of injury time