(Oldest Posts First) - Go To The Latest Post
|
Winning Cups gets a bit of a buzz going and can be good for development of young players. It can also be a great sense of occasion and get young fans excited and attending in their numbers. Obviously there must be some merit and difficulty in doing so, so you don't want to dilute competitions with too many cups. But I'd say a B Championship would be a decent feather to have in your cap. Hardtimes (Cavan) - Posts: 1056 - 12/08/2017 10:54:09 2032549 Link 0 |
|
In defense of the GAA Whammo, I think a lot of underage players get lost to the system because underage competitions within the county are so poorly run. From Cavan's experience I'm talking particularly about the U21 club championship. Minor less so but when players get to this age it can be a case of Senior team or nothing. Hardtimes (Cavan) - Posts: 1056 - 12/08/2017 11:05:33 2032556 Link 0 |
|
Yeah I've thought a lot about how to do this. I also completely agree with you that regionalising the early rounds of championship helps with the excitement. I also think the leagues are a wasted opportunity to do more for the profile of the game. I don't like that they are thrown into February and March, 2 of the worst months for football. They are growing in popularity and I think they could be incorporated into the championship more. I've thought of 2 decent ways to do this. Keep divisions 1-4 as is. Play them in Parallel with Provincial championship. Finish the season with the All Ireland championship, which is seeded based on a mix of Provincials and League. 8 A seeds Provincial champions and best 4 others from league into last 16. 8 B seeds any losing Provincial finalists plus then teams from the league to make up the 8. Enter at last 24 stage. 16 other seeds who play in the first round, which can be played during the same weekend as the Provincial finals. (June Bank Holiday maybe, could be very early but would leave lots of time for club football) There is no B championship but there's a greater profile given to the tiered league structure. A B championship could be played by teams losing in the first 2 rounds if there was interest in it though. A different system Get rid of the Provincials. Go back to a 2 tier league. Division 1 North and South. Division 2 North and South. Division 2 champion qualifies for All Ireland quarter finals. How the playoffs work for each division and how promotion and relegation is determined is flexible. My preferred system would see the following. Top 2 from each division 1 section into quarterfinals 3rd to 5th from each section into playoffs round 1. To return 3 teams, who along with division 2 champion makes up quarterfinals. 6th and 7th go into relegation playoffs. With 2 losers going down. 8th placed teams automatically relegated. 4 Teams relegated Top 2 from each division 2 section into division 2 semifinals 3rd and 4th from each section go into promotion playoffs. Division 2 finalists get promoted Losing semifinalists play against winning 3rd/4th placed teams to get the final 2 promotion spots. Lots to play for throughout the league campaign. In total the competition only takes up 12 game weeks and could be played over 4 months allowing for a suitable number of break weeks. Whammo86 (Antrim) - Posts: 4225 - 12/08/2017 11:58:00 2032567 Link 0 |
|
In the seeded All Ireland system you'd have gotten the following seeding for this year Whammo86 (Antrim) - Posts: 4225 - 12/08/2017 12:13:42 2032568 Link 0 |
|
In the 2 tier regional competition if the groups were based on the this year's National league you'd have the following sections. Whammo86 (Antrim) - Posts: 4225 - 12/08/2017 12:24:44 2032570 Link 0 |
|
I meant Limerick not Longford in division 2 South. I think with that format you're getting a lot of competitive games in each section. With much reduced traveling for fans and players. 1 quarterfinal space reserved for the division 2 champion seems decent. 4 up 4 down keeps a good flow of movement between the divisions. Really almost every team should be entering the season with a realistic aim of winning promotion. There's plenty of knockout championship action with 10 division 1 teams and 4 division 2 teams being involved in the playoffs for Sam. A further 8 teams are involved in relegation/promotion playoffs. Whammo86 (Antrim) - Posts: 4225 - 12/08/2017 13:07:29 2032578 Link 0 |
|
Every person says there is a problem with the championship and mismatches but the GAA don't see that, when we had 10 or 12 counties in with a chance of winning Sam in the late 80s and the entire 1990s all the talk was the GAA was weak in the capital and the GAA need a strong Dublin, no talk of how the game was strong in majority of counties and anybody could win the title, all the talk was about the problems in Dublin, nowadays the dubs bring big crowds as the GAA is strong in the capital due to funding from the GAA and proper underage structures and trainers that are building a monster for the future, you can't see an end to the constant supply of new players but you don't hear anything from the top table (GAA and Croke Park) about weakness in the rest of the country, the Leinster championship is a joke Kildare look like the only team that may challenge Dublin in the future. The GAA don't care what's happening throughout the country as long as there is Dublin v Kerry All Ireland semis or final every year riverboys (Mayo) - Posts: 1389 - 13/08/2017 00:08:13 2032687 Link 1 |