RTÉ Sport analyst Lee Keegan has questioned the GAA's decision to hold the All-Ireland championship round-robin draws before the provincial finals have even been played.
The four groups will be disclosed on Tuesday afternoon, meaning that eight of the 16 teams will have knowledge of two differing potential round-robin paths before a ball has been thrown in.
Five-time All-Star Keegan is unsure about that decision and believes it should have been delayed until after the four provincial champions have been crowned.
"I would have loved to have seen the draw take place next week or the following week, for excitement reasons alone," the Mayo man told the RTÉ GAA Podcast.
"I know it gives teams time and prep, that’s great and that’s lovely, but just for the bit of excitement and drama, to have it on the week entering into the group stage would have been a bit of craic.
"You get that kind of fever for championship so [it's] disappointing from that aspect. Even as a player, the unknown is sometimes more exciting. You go into that week still not knowing and training is going to be a bit of fun.
"All of a sudden you're prepping straight away and all that is going through your head is that one team. I think sometimes that unknown can bring an X-factor and a bit more fun in training."
The group stage begins with half the teams out on the weekend of 20/21 May and the rest the following week.
It’ll be Pot 1 – the provincial winners - versus Pot 3 first off, and with the third seeds containing Mayo, Roscommon, Monaghan and Tyrone, it means that there will be some blockbuster round-one fixtures.
"If you’re seed three, even losing that game is not necessarily the end of the world because if you look at seed two and four, you'd target those games pretty well," Keegan continued.
"As long as you don’t get a hammering that first game. Those teams are all Division 1 teams essentially, so they’ll be playing a Division 1 team.
"It’s going to be a cracking game first off. You look at the groups in general, seeds two and four would be perceived as the weaker seeds so you can still plan and prep your group stage pretty well."
Keegan, meanwhile, believes Kildare boss Glenn Ryan showed courage in speaking so directly about the advantage Dublin get in Croke Park after the Lilywhites' narrow Leinster semi-final loss, but suggests the situation is unlikely to change.
Dublin have been playing home league and the majority of their championship games at Headquarters since 2011, pouring doubt over its neutrality when they are involved in fixtures there.
The Dubs will likely play two of their three round-robin games at the venue, one home fixture and one neutral fixture, with details to be confirmed on Friday.
"Glenn is probably one of the only managers vocally saying it, you have a lot of people talking about it but don’t come out in the media," said Keegan.
"He’s probably getting more criticism over it than he is positivity, but that’s his stance on it.
"The discussion is why is Leinster letting it happen year in, year out?
"Dublin supporters love travelling. They love going on the road and it's an attraction, because they bring such hype around it.
"So it's a no-brainer that they should go to the likes of Portlaoise or Dr Cullen Park.
"I don't get why they don't try and change this. You had 30,000 in Croke Park yesterday but it felt like 30. The atmosphere was dead."
"It’s the same topic year in, year out and until someone does something about it, we’re still going to be discussing it."
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