GAA abuses its own rules
By John Greene

Exactly one year ago, the Sunday Independent exposed the hypocrisy behind the GAA's so-called winter training ban.

Despite widespread flouting of the rule, not one county board was ever taken to task for failing in their duty to implement the GAA's rulebook.

But what was even more remarkable was the revelation that county boards on the one hand were allowing managers to organise training sessions and, on the other, refusing to provide food for players or pay their travelling expenses because they were breaking the rules.

And what is even more remarkable still is the revelation today that, 12 months on, the same thing is happening and once again the GAA is turning a blind eye. Whether you are for or against the idea of a ban is irrelevant, the rule is there and must be enforced. You don't get to pick the ones you like, and ignore the rest.

Sunday Independent
Sunday December 11 2011


County boards exploit hard-pressed players
By Marie Crowe

Ruthless county boards are exploiting players as they openly flout the GAA's winter training ban. The Sunday Independent has established that more than 15 county teams are holding collective training sessions in direct contravention of the GAA's ban. Furthermore, players are not being fed after the sessions, nor receiving travel expenses to attend.

In some cases, as a result of high travelling costs, players who are out of work or studying in college are struggling to make ends meet.

The Sunday Independent spoke to players from seven counties, all of whom asked not to be named, and a disturbing picture of exploitation has emerged.

One well-known player, who attends training three times a week, described the way his team are being treated as something you wouldn't have seen 50 years ago.
"Not only are we not getting fed after training but we were told we had to bring our own water," said the player.
"I leave work at 5.30 to get to training for 8.00 and I have to pay for petrol, food and buy water along the way and then drive back up again. It's a crazy system and there is no one under the illusion that counties aren't training.
"We actually went to the county board and asked for food for the team after training. We would have been happy with a few sandwiches, but we were told that they couldn't justify the cost of it."

The same player feels the ban is actually enabling player burnout because younger players are expected to attend "secret" senior sessions on top of their college and under 21 commitments. He also believes that bad management could eventually lead to burnout in older players.

One footballer, who has represented his county for over a decade, expressed extreme concern for many of his team-mates who are being put under financial pressure.
"Many of them are young lads with no money and they are trying to come up with petrol money and money to eat the right food," he said. "Playing inter-county is an expensive business for players these days and the commitment is financially draining.
"I can't understand how the GPA are allowing this to happen. They know that counties are training and that players are getting treated so badly but they are just ignoring it."

Another disgruntled player said they were under pressure to train this winter because they adhered to the ban last year but found themselves way behind the teams that didn't.
"By the time the club season was over we only got a week and a half break before we had to go back. Last year we were chasing the pack for the whole year. We couldn't let that happen again so right now we are training harder than we ever did," said the player.
"One of our neighbouring counties have not stopped training, they've gone straight through the year. They took a week off after they got knocked out and then went straight back into collective sessions so if we waited until January to go back we'd be way behind."

In many cases, training sessions are being conducted in full public view. Last Saturday, for instance, the St Loman's club in Mullingar posted on its Facebook page that the Westmeath senior squad had been training on the club's astroturf pitch.

And in another instance a Leinster county even organised a challenge game with a Dublin college but called it off at the last minute on advice from their county board. A host of inter-county players have also posted updates on their training schedules on Twitter.

Our attempts to contact the GPA and the GAA to comment on the situation were unsuccessful.

However, it's hard to blame teams for getting on with training as, to date, no county has been found to be in breach of the ban.

Last year it was reported that Cavan were training in Breffni Park yet despite strong words from GAA president Christy Cooney, who said that they would face the relevant punishment, which was that they would lose a percentage of their gate receipts for their home games in the National League, Cavan weren't sanctioned.

The Cavan board wrote to the GAA stating that the team training in Breffni Park was a development squad and that the inter-county players named in a newspaper report were at the ground for rehab work. This was accepted by the GAA.

The controversial ban is set for an overhaul in 2012 following Central Council approval last month. The proposed changes will go before Congress next April and if passed inter-county teams will be allowed back training depending on when they are knocked out of the All-Ireland championship.

The teams that are knocked out at the first stage of qualifiers can return to training on November 15 and the dates are staggered as they progress in the competition. If a team reaches the final, they cannot return to training until December 29. On top of this, a Christmas break will also be enforced for a week from December 21-28.

Sunday Independent
Sunday December 11 2011


Ignoring the burnout problem won't make it go away
The spring fixtures logjam is a symptom of a greater malaise, says Colm O'Rourke

The closed season in football is as open as it could possibly be. All right, there are no games but almost everything else goes for county teams. There are very few counties, if any, not training in some collective form or other as county boards have decided to ignore one of their own regulations.

Of course they will argue that these sessions are not sanctioned by them, they are not paying travelling, medical or any other expenses so even if all the players show up at the same place at the same time it does not mean they are engaging in some form of collective training. In the same way, just because something looks like a duck and walks like a duck does not mean it is a duck.

It looks as if the days of the blanket closed season are numbered anyway. This was only part of a wide-ranging strategy of a committee that I was part of a few years ago. Many of the more important items were defeated at Congress which left the idea of a closed season look a little foolish in isolation. Its main purpose was to give some form of a break in activity to players who were feeling the effects of burnout, a phrase coined to describe the harmful effects of too much training and competition on both the body and mind of a young player.

Naturally, it was going to have a limited effect as many of those who the rule was trying to protect are playing with colleges in third-level competition -- at least that is the limit of their involvement coming up to Christmas so travel and extra training is reduced.

Now there are those who don't think there is such a thing as burnout at all and young players should be well able to play and train several times a week. They should also be able to travel long distances to training and work or study as well. These are in a minority and most people in charge of teams now seem to be giving as much importance to rest and recovery as to training.

The problem remains the multiplicity of competitions in spring. Even many of those who agree with the idea of burn-out don't seem to understand that all these competitions cannot run together without causing problems. Choices will have to be made sooner or later.

In other words, you cannot argue to retain college football, under 21, National League and All-Ireland club competitions in the month of February and at the same time agree that something must be done about protecting young players. The skeleton of the old Railway Cup is being thrown into that mix; it's a competition I really enjoyed playing in but one that is now only throwing petrol on the fire. Maybe the provincial competitions and the under 21s should be held off until later in the year.

The closed season never banned training but did ban normal organised county team training, which many county boards were quite happy with as it saved them a lot of money. In a way then county teams training in November and December is not a mortal sin so long as the training is of the right type -- and the rules are probably going to be changed for next year anyway.

The right training should be concentrated on the rehabilitation of players who have suffered injuries and need particular strengthening work. There are no farmers anymore so a lot of the traditional natural toughness must be artificially created in the gym. Nothing wrong with that either but football is for footballers not sumo wrestlers.

Then there is a lot of valuable work which can be done pre-season on ensuring injuries don't take place. Most counties take a fairly scientific approach to this so a period of time spent in this way before the start of the season can prevent a lot of problems later on.

However, there are some counties where the vomit merchants take over at this time of year.

These are the trainers who believe in maximum punishment, pushing players to the limit and beyond. Some seem to believe that a queue of players getting sick on the side of the pitch is an indication that their training is working. It may be the sort of training needed to join the marines, but not for football even if an occasional session which tests the mental fabric of a player is worthwhile. Those who give up in training will give up in a big game when they are needed most.

So if you happen to wander into a county ground over the next couple of weeks and there are players running about who seem very familiar, you can be sure it is not the county side for next year busying themselves in preparations. And if some of the important county board officials happen to be watching on then you can be absolutely certain it is not an organised training session in contravention of their own rules.

It reminds me of the three wise monkeys: Kikazuru covers his ears and hears no evil, Iwazuru covers his mouth and speaks no evil and, most important, Mizaru covers his eyes and sees no evil.

Sunday Independent
Sunday December 11 2011