The countdown to our fifth championship match of the summer is now on in earnest. No better time, then, for the latest edition of the Mayo News football podcast, which previews Saturday’s Round 4A qualifier meeting with Cork at the Gaelic Grounds in Limerick (throw-in 5pm).
Host Rob Murphy and Mayo News editor Mike Finnerty are behind the controls for this edition. Special guest is Sunday Times GAA correspondent Michael Foley, who also happens to be a Cork native. (He also happened to write one of the truly great GAA books of all time – Kings of September – but that’s another story entirely). Michael provides some insight into Saturday’s match from a Cork perspective and gives his thoughts on our back door performances this year.
Making a return to the podcast for the first time in a while is former Mayo player Billy Fitzpatrick, who talks about how we’re getting on so far this summer.
This latest episode of the podcast is now available on both iTunes and SoundCloud and you can also listen to it here on the site – all you need to do is click the player below. Enjoy!
Willie Joe, slighty off topic but is that true what ya wrote a couple of days back in a different thread about Dublin getting 1 million of taxpayers money as some sort of payment or grant every year just for themselves?
If true its a disgrace. Leinster is a basket case as it is.
Maybe i read it wrong or imagined it. In which case, apologies if i’ve broken a house rule or 2 and delete this comment for sure if there is no truth in my first paragraph above.
Grate podcast guys mayo by 2 or 3 for me but I would take a one point win too and on two HQ
It’s true alright, Jim Flag, and apologies as I meant to add a link to a report about this at the time but then forgot. It’s essentially Bertie money that Dublin – alone – gets each year from the Irish Sports Council on top of the share-out of development money, of which of course they also get the lion’s share. And people wonder why other Leinster counties have given up. The piece explaining all this is here.
what is the answer to the Jim Flag question about Dublin getting a one million euro grant?
Jim
Dublin Hurling gets 1 Million Euros a year in a grant administered by the Irish Sports Council, and has done every year since 2005.
details here:
http://www.sportireland.ie/Media/Latest_News/2005/September/IRISH_SPORTS_COUNCIL_Minister_launches_ISC_funding_of_%E2%82%AC3_5m_to_GAA.html
some more details of the funding here:
https://www.balls.ie/gaa/gaa-investment-in-dublin-348120
Looking forward to the game and as usual the podcast has whetted the appetite sufficiently ahead of that. For me, I’m optimistic. The second half against Clare felt like a renaissance of sorts, like the first time a discernible Rochford game plan clicked into gear, the players looked ravenous again to boot. If we up it again from that second half we’ll have too much for Cork. They can’t be taken for granted but I’m just after leaving the real capital and the consensus is they’re in utter disarray.
Some more info on Dublin’s funding here:
https://www.balls.ie/gaa/paraic-duffy-2-bertie-ahern-dublin-356952
If the super 8 is to become attractive that money needs to be spread around. I’m sure Sky will have some kind of input to that given their interest in the super 8s. In fact super 8 needs to 12/16 – ie Offaly Armagh (possible former strongholds who have fallen behind need that money, not Dublin). The principles of the NBA draft system need to apply. Croke Park and the middle ranking officials (Co Board level) who appear to want the game to adopt some form of professionalism need the number expanded also.
Financial doping is the most apt term in relation to Dublin gaa. I wonder how many Leinster titles in a row Dublin will win before the Leinster council grow a pair of balls and stand up to the conglomerate. I get the terrible feeling that in 20 years we’ll be looking back at this time and be asking ourselves why did no-one shout stop.
Not even the GAA would wait 20 years and as an organisation it has been conservative in the extreme but Sky sure as he’ll won’t wait that long. They will want immediate return on their money and as much growth as possible. They don’t exactly do things for the “glory of the little parish”.
Does anyone know of free parking near the Gaelic Grounds on Saturday? I’m traveling with a senior citizen and we’ll need to park nearby. We’ll be there a few hours before throw in. Thanks
I see Durty Nellies in Bunratty are offering a main course meal and transport to the match for 15e. They will drop you off close to the ground and you park your car at Durty Nellies.And i presume collect you after the match.
Great podcast really enjoyed it…. especially Billy Fitz
Thanks for that RosTown. Just checked it out there and seems like a good option.
Yeah there will be several buses and they’ll pick up afterwards and return you to Bunratty. No booking just pay on the day.
Drop off likely at Ivans (600m from the grounds) but they may even try to get nearer this year I was told.
2014 we got a shuttle from the Radisson. It turned out to be a bit of a joke as we were no sooner on it when we had to get off and walk given road closures… and walk a fair oul distance at that. Granted there was a big crowd at that match. We ended up having to then get a taxi after to hotel. Partly to avoid the walk back again to bus and partly to get the heck away from the place as soon as possible! Certainly a day to forget. Let’s hope Saturday is one to remember.
Thanks Willie Joe for that and to the others who posted about the funding for Dublin. The logic behind it is beyond me.
Sorry for hijacking this thread. Now back to Cork.
For me the starting full forward line has to be Loftus, Cillian and Andy Moran. Three danger men. Three goal makers/takers. Three confident shooters.
It’s absolutely infuriating reading some of those statistics.
And we have to be patronised on a weekly basis by so called experts telling us this team is the 8th wonder of the world.
Absolutely scandalous, and incredible that nobody seems to have the bollocks to speak out against it, barring the odd few above.
Absolutely it’s good to know some of the truth.. But realistically has anyone ever heard any ‘journalists’ ever questioned the GAA funding system?.. I cannot recall it ever happening!.. Has our County board ever publicly questioned any thing?.. And has the other County board’s ever publicly questioned anything either?.. I cannot recall that either!.. You know the way our own County board handled or mishandled the application of McStay and McHale?… Can we realistically expect the same people to put themselves in the firing line and speak out?.. Don’t hold your breath! , The GAA is a wonderful organisation, it’s volunteers and participants make it such, but it’s so long since I heard any serious discord, it’s remarkable everything must be seem so rosy in the garden..Is there an acceptance that the GAA is close to infallible?.. Time for some home truths to be told to the top brass, and a bit less of the unquestioning acceptance of every dictate from on high!
‘Whinge, moan, whine and repeat’ is a phrase used on Reservoir Dubs in connection to the ‘begrudery’ of Mayo and Kerry to the enormous advantage in the funding of Dublin GAA… It also states that Mayo spent more than Dublin in 2016.. Now that is true, but it was an exceptional year, our U21s got to the All Ireland final and won, our hurlers won the Nickey Rackard Cup,in Croke Park, our Junior’s got to the All Ireland final in Croke Park, , and Mayo Senior’salso had to play 5 championship match’s in Croke Park.. So that’s just for Croke Park alone, 7 trips that had to be paid for, plus the hotel accommodation, food etc for a big team that travels with the players as well.
Also Mayo have to pay for all these guys that live and work in Dublin to bring them to training in Mayo throughout the year… Dublin have none of these expenses, and they did not even have to pay for Croke Park that was funded by the whole of the GAA community, but Dublin benefits more from it than just as a home venue for virtually every important match…. If anything when you consider all that Dublin don’t have to pay for, especially when compared to Mayo, Kerry or Donegal, their funding should only be a fraction of what we should receive!
Leantimes – don’t forget a trip to London and all Ireland u21 hurling final.
In 2016 we appeared in more all Ireland finals than any other county. To be surprised that we spent the most money as a result is baffling and it’s pathetic to try to use that as an argument for Dublin’s ridiculous funding
Leantimes, Ewan McKenna regularly raises it, but it rarely gets mentioned and he gets tons of abuse from the Dub Social media machine for raising it.
The Cork preview podcast thread, and Dublin funding is being discussed. We should really do a Q&A session titled “Everything you ever wanted to know about Dublin, but were afraid to ask”. There is so much half-truth, out and out mistruth, and speculation in this thread about funding, I wouldn’t know where to start with it. Essentially, alot of it boils down to defending the DCB for doing their job well.
As for Ewan, he’s a journalist trying to get attention. He’d put the boot into anyone if it got him another twitter follower. He’s half the reason I don’t look at social media any more.
Back to Cork. No matter what way I fudge it, I can’t see Mayo losing this. Cork are just not in the right place at the moment. Sure they’ve a sting in their tail, but if you can’t put away Cork, you’ve no right to be thinking of Croker in August/September.
Cork will try spraying high ball into the square as a go-to tactic. I’m not sure Caff is the man to under this ball when it drops in. He seems off the pace a little, which is understandable given the nature of the injury he’s returning from.
Parsons and AN Other are going to have a hard shift in midfield. But that’s the platform on which success can be built.
Both forward lines have been guilty of poor shot selection and execution this year. The team that addresses this, wins.
Expecting a fight, but also a nervy 2 point win. Then the fun begins with the quarters.
you’re right about Half truths Jaden – I see plenty being bandied about on Boards by Dublin folks (one of whom also seem to post here) about Mayo’s Debt being apparently being paid by everyone else (its really not) and also fabrications about how Mayo spent more than Dublin, completely failing to take into account how Mayo played 6 games away from home in the Championship one of which was in London and the other 5 in Croke park. Also failing to take into account the games involving under 21 football and Hurling, Nicky Rackard and the fact that at least 10 of the panel live in Dublin and the mileage costs that entails.
I strongly suspect if the whole truth came out about all funding to Dublin GAA going back to the start of the Celtic tiger to the present day there would be a lot of embarrassed bucks running for cover . It’s difficult for a Dublin supporter to not defend even the most ludicrous stuff, that’s what supporters do but honestly lad Dublin has not become this conveyer belt of talent because it’s suddenly become populated by Gaelic football stars. They have received ridiculously disproportionate amounts of funding . Look at underage history , your graph doesn’t just change like that , sorry pal but it’s true.
Done Deal,.. I think Connacht GAA looks after the London and New York trips.
The “Ridiculously Disproportionate” is debatable, but, as for the rest, I won’t deny that there is a conveyor belt of talent – in fact, the polar opposite is true – I’m bloody well proud of it. Con O Callaghan is a product of that conveyor belt, how many Mayo versions of him are not playing right now, owing to the lack of an underage development plan?
The DCB planned, documented, developed and executed a long term strategy for developing GAA within the county, with complete emphasis on underage structures, and coaching. The GAA reviewed the plan, approved it, and funded it.
There was no smash and grab, no secret deals in the dark corridors of power, just a County Board doing what it was put there to do. There is literally not a damned thing to stop anyone else from doing the same – the template is even laid out, it just has to be copied.
If there is one thing I have learned from this blog, it’s that the MCB draw the near universal ire of supporters. Yet in a thread about Cork (!), during a round of questioning Dublin’s success, not one person has asked how can a County Board, who can raise and spend over a million Euros on their Senior Football team ALONE, not find the funding for a Commercial Director which other sources within the county are happy to subsidize.
Croke/Parnell Park is not where you should be looking for answers, McHale Park is.
1985-2001 =not a single under 21 provincial title , is that true ?
2002, ’03, ’05, ’09, ’10, ’12, ’14, ’15, ’16, ’17 Leinster under 21 titles.
That’s odd to be fair. Now you can tell me about this Trojan effort by DCB till the cows come home but it was not done without serious funding a lot of which was unfair.
@Sean, this is descending into something off topic, I see no value to dragging it out.
You seem to accept that the DCB was doing it’s job. Absolutely it took serious funding to achieve it’s aim, but it was a serious plan.
What part of applying for and being granted development funding do you think was “unfair”? Who was being unfair, and to whom?
Jaden, surely even you can see that the GAA agreeing to providing a disproportionate share of funding to a team that already enjoys home advantage for every Football game (except for 2 events in 10 years that were played somewhere other than the county of their opposition), not to mention the sponsorship received, or the extra 1 Million a year provided directly to support hurling might be deemed somewhat unfair to the rest of the country?.
As regards the spend on the Mayo County team – the Senior Footballers are by far the biggest draw and largest source of revenues to the Mayo County board – it’s obvious that they will be the ones the Mayo county board focuses its spending on. Sponsors (we don’t have 8 of them either) will expect the same.
Again, I’ll point out that there was a game in London and 5 games in Croke park in the championship alone – as well as a number of the panel who live and work in Dublin. The cost of travel and accommodation is a lot to do with this but then that might be hard to grasp for a county where none of thep layers have to travel any further than 25Km to get to a home match or training.
Ah for Chrisake lads, the obsession is unhealthy, but seeing as WJ hasn’t banned me yet, I’ll bite.
First things first. The GAA NOT NOT PROVIDE ONE RED CENT in funding the Dublin Senior Football team, no more than they do to Kerry or Mayo.
Dublin DO NOT decide where their home games are played, period. In fact, they have to pay for the use of Croke Park for home fixtures.
In the Championship, all quarters, semis and the finals are played in Croke Park. The GAA Decide this.
For the provincials, the Leinster Council, vote 22-2 to move all fixtures featuring Dublin to Croke Park, (or some other neutral ground), while the sole objection being whomever was drawn against Dublin for that round. The Leinster Council decide this.
If you are suggesting pooling all Sponsorship to a common fund, and dividing it up evenly so as to remove any advantage, you essentially remove any motivation for any CB to try to get the best deal possible – ie, you decrease the revenue from sponsorship. It’s not that easy an issue to resolve. Imagine cutting a deal with Elvery’s, and then handing over half the cheque to central.
As for the year on year costs of running the Mayo senior team, let me present a “fact”.
2016 – Five away games in the Championship for SF Team. (London is paid for my Provincial Council, as already pointed out). Expenditure over €1,000,000.
2015, Also five away games in the Championship for the SF team. Expenditure for all codes and levels was €830,000, assuming proportional split to Seniors, spend would be ~€520,000
Same amount of travel – huge difference in spend?
I’m quoting the same graphic you are. It’s all BS of course when you drill into the data, you see why it was like this.
Likewise is proportional development funding. The figures from the other thread show Dublin get 11x funding, but with 10x the population. Hardly disproportional – but you know, post a number, don’t contextualize it, and cue pitchforks and torches calling for justice to be served. People don’t want rational explanation – they want sensation. And a nice juicy number like 1.46Million gives it to them.
The GAA have serious issues to tackle, and to be honest, will require everyone to solve them. Finger pointing based on some number you read somewhere on the internet is not the best way to go about this.
Deny it all you like but only playing 2 games away from home (and not even at the ground of the opposition faced) in the championship is a huge advantage, whatever way you want to cut it or pretend it’s not. The fact that no investment needs to be made to a stadium for your county team is surely a distinct advantage given it would evidently reduce the capital spending too.
I’m not suggesting for a minute that sponsorship should be pooled, but surely the massive sponsorship money received by Dublin needs to be taken into account when funding is being handed out.
As regards the spend between 2016 and 2015, the figures for 2016 include around 150K of a spend from 2015, due to late invoicing – and that’s a fact. You’re also including 2 away games that were within the province in the 2015 – as no doubt you’ll know, the less distance you have to travel (a la your own county which never have to) the less such travel cost incurred. Dublin is infinitely more expensive to get to and to stay in – it makes sense that on that alone, it would incur greater costs due to the 5 games there in 2016 vs the 3 in 2015.
If you want to contextualize numbers – lets do that –
Number of registered players in Mayo in 2015 – 10,635
Number of registered players in Dublin in 2015 – 39,197
Games Development Funding per registered player in Mayo in 2015 – EUR 22.3
Games Development Funding per registered player in Dublin in 2015 – EUR 274.7
Games Development Funding per County Population- Mayo in 2015 – EUR 1,566
Games Development Funding per registered player in Dublin in 2015 – EUR 5,905
Source of the above is a series of tweets from Shane Mangan on the 5th of October 2016, who sourced them directly from the GAA reports. Seek them out if you like.
By any metric, Dublin are given a distinct financial advantage over everyone else – you can’t deny that.
Whilst I am loathe to praise DCB,I have to agree with Jaden ,it is no good been jealous of Dublin we must demand similar or better funding because of our size and so many players outside the county, and no red herrings about Mac Hale park ,hell freeze over before we get a quarter of the funding Croke park gets,we need a county board who demands equal treatment
No point moaning about funding. Mayo have been backed well in recent years and have been given the platform to win Sam but haven taken it.
When it comes down to the next few weeks of the championship, money won’t be the deciding factor on who wins the all -Ireland.
As for Saturday, confident we will progress and gain more valuable time on the pitch for hopefully harder tests to come in forthcoming weeks.
Lads, the current Dublin team aren’t the best side because of funding, they’re the best side because they have the strongest panel and some of the best forwards in the land. Their county board also had the vision to put in place a strategic plan and the will to drive it through, so kudos to them for that.
They have some natural advantages (marketability, population, Dublin being the economic centre of the country) that we will never have. That’s life, it’s extremely hard to address those issues and we have to make the best of our situation. Look at the some of the Ulster sides of the past 20 years or so and they’ve overcome far bigger hurdles to claim Sam.
I do agree that the money issue will, however, only increase the gap between themselves and the rest in future unless HQ do something about it. They show little inclination of doing so at present, so it’s up to Congress delegates in all these other counties to show some gumption, coordinate and force the issue.
Now back to the football…
We are well capable of winning this, but I don’t think it will be the cakewalk that some posters believe. We need to start the game at championship intensity and remain disciplined (no silly cards again!). We also need to be ready for the high ball that Cork will probably test our full-back line with. Do these things, and we should, on the balance of recent championship pedigree, do the business by 5 or 6 points.
Revert to some of the staleness and indiscipline of recent championship games, and we’re in for a sticky evening.
Maigh Eo abú!
Jaden, in 2016, Mayo took part in two all Ireland senior football finals, a senior hurling Nicky Rackard final, and u21 football final and an u21 hurling final.
That would explain the difference in expenditure
well said It Means Nothing to Me.
There will always be certain advantages for Dublin but the reality is the strategic planning, the winning mentality and having top class forwards is the reason for their success.
You don’t buy mentality and they didn’t buy their quality forwards.
You don’t think those top class forwards having far more access to full time coaches throughout their youth careers made a difference?
No , I don’t. Do you really think their coaches have a secret code to being a top class forward that only money buys?
Brogan, Connolly etc have talent and desire that goes way beyond their coaching. Was The Gooch so good due to funding? Was Ciaran McDonald so class due to a full time expensive coach ?
No, I don’t. Do you really think their coaches have a secret code to being a top class forward that only money buys?.
Brogan, Connolly etc have a talent and desire that goes way beyond their coaching, Was the Gooch so good due to funding?
Was Ciaran McDonald so class due to a full time expensive coach?
@mayomark – It would if the total expenditure for U21F U21H and Senior H wasn’t each in the 10-15% range of the total. Those 3 codes were 1/3 of total spend. Even if 2015 to 2016 expenditure for each Doubled because of progression to finals, (and that’s a big if) that’s 18% onto the bottom line. 300K in invoicing difference still leaves the high side of a quarter of a million in increase.
But it’s all a red herring – Senior expenditure is self financed – neither Mayo, nor Kerry, nor Dublin get a penny from anywhere outside the county. You can’t buy Sam.
There is a law of diminishing return for funding the Senior Team, at which point more money will not make things tangibly better. There are several (maybe 8 or 9) counties already at that level. We need to get every county serious about football to that level. I honestly don’t have the answers to that issue, at least not in a way that penalizes performance for some. But that’s one part of it, having the finance available is one thing – getting bang for buck out of that investment is entirely another. We could hand the Wicklow County Board 20 million right now, and they’d still not be competing at national level in 10 years. I leave the reasoning as to why with the reader.
Dublin get alot of Money for development funding. But with accusations of “Financial Doping”, people try to equate this Development Funding directly with Senior Footballing success. Anyone with an ounce of cop-on sees this link as tenuous at best, and deceptive at worst.
The amount of funding per registered player means what? You fund development in a county to get kids playing football, not to pay registered players.
The true discrepancy is seen when you compare the development funding with population in general. Mayo have a ridiculously high ratio of Registered player to Population of 10% – I think only Kerry can even compete with that.
Dublin’s is a little over 3.5%. That’s 3:1 in favour of Mayo. It really is an amazing statistic.
Adjusting Dev funding for population I think leaves the ratio of funding between Dublin and Mayo @ 4:1 in favour of Dublin. Douse the torches and put away the pitchforks.
Anyway (and sorry, it’s just a sore point with me), back to Cork.
I have an observation.
Mayo have struggled recently (2-3 years) against weaker opposition, and raise their game against stronger opposition. Not really a groundbreaking revelation.
So how they fare against Cork is really down to Cork being either good or shite. Is they’re good, Mayo will hammer them out the gate, if they’re shite, it will be a tighter game. I happen to believe in scenario #2.
I just cannot see a loss on the cards, and that’s about a neutral a stance as you can get.
Jaden – How much are the DCB paying you to spread this propaganda?
If Jim Gavin was managing Cork for the next five years and the Cork manager was managing Dublin, would the situation for each team reverse. I think so. Like stats, money is a help but without the knowhow it’s just money down the drain.
Maigh Eo Go Deo – why is the propaganda? Jaden makes excellent points.
E.G – ‘You can’t buy Sam’ AND ‘We could hand the Wicklow County Board 20 million right now, and they’d still not be competing at national level in 10 years.’
This attitude that funding is fair / unfair is pointless and negative. Mayo have great players today and in the past and will have in the future and opportunities have been there to win finals and are still there now.
Jaden is right about one thing, just throwing money at something will not automatically solve an issue. Dublin County Board implemented a strategic plan in 2010 called the “Blue Wave”. It mapped out everything that is now happening, none of this is a surprise to those who planned it. That same year a similar strategic review was commissioned by the Mayo County Board, they rejected it as too radical. it actually recommended changes 7 years ago that even Dublin are only now implementing. The reason I keep coming back to the “Horan Plan” is that the same indivduals that rejected it are still involved in the CB at different levels. We will never win the All Ireland until we professionalise our executive. Players and managers win games and championships, but administrations put process in place that ensure you continue to win them. You could give Mayo CB an extra €1 million and I seriously doubt they would use it properly.
Dublin clubs sent 600 players forward for minor trials last year, that’s the best 5-10% within each club. If they’ve a panel of 35-40 can you imagine the filters you can apply and how ruthless they can be in selection. I doubt there’s 600 minor players in the whole county of Mayo. Dublin are like the wayward son of a blue blooded family, the potential was always there but they didn’t always live up to it. Now they’ve got their act together and started to utilise all the resources that are at their disposal they’ve become a serious force and I cannot for the life of me see how any Dublin supporter cannot acknowledge the myriad advantages they have.