Queen’s manager Conor Deegan has endorsed the decision not to implement the new playing rules in next month’s Sigerson Cup.

Eyebrows were raised when it was announced that the third level competition would be exempt from the new FRC rules which will be applied at both club and inter-county level in 2025. However, Deegan doesn’t think playing under two different sets of rules will prove too problematic for his inter-county contingent.

“The only positive thing about it is that they will be coming back to us to play rules that they have been playing with for quite a long time,” the 1991 and ’94 Down All-Ireland winning full back told reporters at this week’s draw for the 2025 Sigerson Cup.

“It should be a slightly easier transition going back to us than it would be going the other way, but it is going to cause a few problems.

“Our players are intelligent enough lads that they will be able to work it out, and it is just as basic as that unfortunately, but it is probably better that way than going the other way, which I think would be much more difficult.

“The issue is — and it is quite a simplistic one — when they were voted in, you weren’t getting enough time to work on it.

“I understand that it could have been used and seen as a focal point to have a look at the new rules and how they play out but unless you had all your players all of the time, it was going to be very, very difficult to implement it in that four or five-week period.”

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