Tipperary captain Brendan Maher lifts the Liam MacCarthy Cup.
By Paul Keane
GAA President Aogán Ó Fearghail has assured hurling supporters that plans are underway to tweak the Championship structure and bring it into line with football's new 'Super 8' format.
O Fearghail acknowledged that, if unchecked, there would be a considerable imbalance between the amount of football and hurling Championship games played during the peak summer months from 2018, when the 'Super 8' format begins.
Various hurling commentators have pointed this out and O Fearghail, speaking at the launch of the GAA museum's new 'Imreoir to Bainisteoir' exhibition, said those fears are real and need to be addressed.
He revealed that the broad outline of a plan is in place and currently being discussed by officials and that a proposal could potentially come before a Special Congress gathering later this year, allowing for change as early as 2018.
"A lot of counties told me that they would support, and they did support at Congress, the reforms in inter-county football but they said that really in hurling we need to be moving," said O Fearghail.
"I've always said it publicly to you, and privately to the counties, that we need to focus on football at the moment but we've got that done and now hurling needs to be addressed. There's no doubt about it.
"It's the one thing in the whole debate that I absolutely accept - if you have a lot more inter-county games in football and you don't do something about hurling, that would have an effect on hurling."
Asked if a new format could be in place as early as next year, O Fearghail nodded.
"It can of course," he said. "We need to do something similar (to football). We have the broad outline of a plan there. Again, it will be Central Council that will lead on it, it has to be. But myself and the Ard Stiúrthóir have written to our various committees here and shown them a broad outline of a plan for the reform of the hurling championship that would be broadly similar to football, more games at the end stages but, again, in a tighter period.
"I think it needs to happen because we could never do anything that might damage hurling and there was always the chance that if you had a lot more football it could have that impact."
museum
Ó Fearghail said that a plan will also be presented in a matter of weeks for a tightening of the inter-county fixture schedule, freeing up more space for club activity.
"At the moment we are very close to having a substantial fixtures template to show we are able to condense the inter-county calendar and it will be a shorter period they are playing in and there will be additional games because of the changes we made to the quarter-finals (of the football Championship) but we believe we will be able to do it in a tighter time frame giving more space to clubs and I am certainly very happy with what I see happening on it and I hope in June that Central Council are able to share it with the wider GAA community," he said.
"We need now to be able to say, 'this is the way it will look'. I think that when Central Council look at it, I'm hoping Central Council approve it and it will be a substantial improvement for clubs."
O Fearghail confirmed that he met with representatives of the Club Players Association and had positive discussions with them.
"We had a meeting with two or three of the lads from the CPA and we had discussions, we let them know what we are doing, we made a strong commitment to looking after our fixtures in total and we have a very strong commitment that we made to Congress that we have to deliver," said O Fearghail.
"In fairness to Congress, a lot of them took what we did on trust, we made substantial changes to the football Championship and a lot of them knew, because myself and Pauric kept telling them, that this is going to have to involve a condensing of the Championship. It just has to happen.
"We have to now put meat on that and we are working very strongly on it. We showed the CPA and different groups that. There are a lot of committees in Croke Park who are looking at it.
"I have always said since I started out that I wanted Central Council to lead on it, on these processes, and they will.
"So at the June meeting I am hopeful we will be able to show quite a substantial fixtures programme that I believe - it's not complete yet - but it will show we are very determined to make a substantial change to our fixture programming in line with Congress decisions."
The GAA Museum's new exhibition celebrates players who have won All-Irelands as both players and managers. There are 13 hurlers, 11 footballers and six camogie players who have claimed All-Ireland medals as a player and manager. The group includes legends such as Mick O'Dwyer, Kevin Heffernan, Brian Cody and Ann Downey.
