The provincial skirmishes in this year’s all-changed-changed-utterly Championship continued this weekend, clarifying a few things in the process. This year’s likely Connacht champions for starters. Plus the moribund nature of the Leinster and Munster Championships. There was a there-but-for-the-grace-of-God moment, with Colm O’Rourke’s Meath, who have consistently punched below their weight for a generation at this stage, finding themselves in […]
The GAA’s Central Council are due to meet this weekend to consider the two Championship structure reform proposals that were put forward by a working group the association convened in the wake of last year’s Special Congress, which saw the radical Proposal B narrowly fail to gain the required 60% support. As you may recall from a piece I did […]
It’s rather apposite, on the shortest day of the year, to be considering the topic of the GAA’s football Championship structure, given that the business end of the action will be taking place in high summer, when the bright evenings stretch on for hours on end. New plans for changing the structure of the football Championship are afoot. The fresh […]
The 2022 Connacht Championship draw that was made a short while ago today certainly didn’t do ourselves or Galway any favours. We’ve been drawn against each other at the quarter-final stage, with the winners then facing Leitrim or London in the semis. On the other side of the draw, meanwhile, Roscommon have to all intents and purposes been handed a […]
The GAA’s Special Congress takes place tomorrow where the future shape of the football Championship is down for debate. Coming into tomorrow’s Special Congress there’s a distinct feeling that change is in the air, though it’s still far from clear how the key vote will go. Proposal A – which is centred on reconfiguring the four provinces into four groups […]
In a normal year we’d know by now not only our full schedule of National League games for the following spring but also what the draw is for the next year’s provincial Championships. This year we still know neither of these things. That’s because the structure of the inter-county football competitions for 2022 remain up in the air, with proposals […]
Right, 72 hours or so have passed since the final whistle was blown in this year’s All-Ireland final – and, with it, time called once again on our hopes of lifting the Sam Maguire – and the world has kept on turning. As it always must, as it always will. Fair play to the lot of you, you’ve kept the […]
Mayo’s Championship campaign continues on Sunday, as they take on Leitrim in the Connacht semi-final at MacHale Park, with Galway awaiting the winners in the provincial final later in the month. In this episode of the Mayo News football podcast we preview the Leitrim game in the company of Mayo News sports editor Mike Finnerty who is joined by Billy […]
Saturday’s outsized win over Sligo, combined with the tankings Kerry and Donegal dished out to Clare and Down respectively over the weekend, has led to plenty of complaints about all that’s wrong with the current Championship structure. These are sentiments I’d agree with wholeheartedly and are ones I’ve voiced myself – I recall banging on about this topic when the […]
The fall-out from the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic continues to be felt right across society in Ireland and around the world. Needless to say, the GAA is affected in the same way as other sectors and, with Level 5 Covid restrictions now confirmed to remain in place until at least the early days of March, the start of the 2021 inter-county […]