In his annual report to Congress, GAA Director General Paraic Duffy has said that the introduction of match bans instead of time based penalties is something the GAA must seriously consider.

"The idea of specific 'match bans' in the GAA has long been suggested as one way of addressing the inequities that arise in terms of suspensions in our games," writes Duffy.

"This situation is particularly noticeable at intercounty level, where the irregular nature of fixture scheduling means that at times there are frequently 4 or 5 week gaps between championships games and in a scenario where the 'four weeks' suspension is most common in our games, it leads to a situation where many players effectively do not miss a single game, despite being suspended for four weeks."

In making his case Duffy gives the example of the 16 players who received eight weeks suspensions during the 2009 season. Four missed no games, four missed just one game, one missed two games, one missed three games, five missed four games and one missed five games.

"There is an obvious and clear imbalance is any system where one player serves no suspension for the same offence that another player can miss five games for.

"I am confident that we will be in a position to propose a workable and acceptable system to the 2011 Annual congress for the consideration of our members. A key component of this will be that match bans at inter-county level should be carried over into the following year's competitions and from league competitions into championships."

On proposed changes to the championship formats, Duffy believes that the current provincial system serves the GAA well and talk on moving away from that does not take into account the way that clubs and county's administer nationally through their provinces.

"It is a simple fact that games in the provincial championships continue to attract a significantly larger attendance that those in the first four rounds of the qualifiers, even when the exact same counties are involved.

"For most counties, a provincial title remains a realistic and desirable championship goal at the start of each season. The fact that attendances have remained constant at provincial games since the introduction of the qualifiers would seem to indicate that our supporters feel likewise.

"Many of those who criticise the provincial system claim that the introduction of the All-Ireland qualifiers has diminished the championships because of the essential 'do or die' element is no longer a factor. One is led to wonder, therefore, why it is that the most oft-quoted alternative is a 'Champions League' style group of four structure, a system that would even further diminish the knock-out spirit of the championships."

The new playing rules currently under consideration also come up for mention and Duffy is critical of those who denounce experimental playing rules even before they have had a chance to consider them at length.

"What I find dispiriting about the debate on these rules is the haste with which people express their opinion on experimental rules even before experimentation has begun. The whole idea of experimenting with change is to see how the theory will operate in practice.

"Yet, whether it concerns disciplinary or playing rules, the same small group of 'experts' ritually decry the changes before most players, supporters and administrators even had the chance to see the proposed changes in action." Tweet

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