A decade ago, an academic paper was published to examine how the GAA could adopt an innovative approach through strategic decision-making to maintain its amateur ethos while successfully competing in the professional sporting market.
The comprehensive and prescient paper was entitled 'Amateurism in an Age of Professionalism: An Empirical Examination of an Irish Sporting Culture: The GAA' by Ian Keller and Dr Angela Wright of Munster Technological University.
It focused on many areas that are still a source of concern to the GAA.
Fundamentally, the MTU study recommended that the strong links between the GAA and the community must be both nurtured and enhanced.
It recommended that the challenges that the branding success of foreign sports brought should also be embraced by the association.
And it shone a light on how player welfare issues for the elite players should be addressed while continuing to protect the club and its amateur structures.
The study looked at not just the importance of the amateur ethos to the GAA, but also development of the marketing, branding and profiling of Gaelic games that could enhance the performance of an amateur sporting organisation in an era of increased professionalism in sport.
A range of recommendations were made, including a player welfare system that would protect the elite players while always retaining the amateur ethos, better education opportunities for elite players that would incorporate elite education grants, the creation of a better club and county balance by a centralised directive from Croke Park, and the creation of a players’ fund for county teams based on a percentage of the revenue generated from a county's participation in championship games were all suggested.
A strategic review of the marketing policies implemented by the GAA was also proposed so that games were constantly visualised through the media and broadcasters.
And the recommendation that the GAA should implement a strategy for the creation of a 'player’s brand’ through the profiling of elite players was put forward with the goal to build visual role models for young players.
The study noted that, at the time, the GAA did not embrace the profile of its players in any meaningful way compared to rugby, who constantly marketed their games by enhancing the profile of their elite stars.
Since then, many of the observations this study made have been heeded by the GAA.
A split season has been introduced. A player charter was agreed and a mandatory female player charter is on the way.
During the pandemic, it was highlighted more than ever how important the community was to the association.
And through scholarships and welfare programmes with the GPA, education for elite players is a cornerstone of their careers.
But there has been no halting of the runaway train that is inter-county expenditure.
Nor has there been any reduction in training regimes – in fact, there has been a gradual acceleration for top level players.
That bracket of players find themselves in demand from club, college and county, meaning they have little or no break.
Management set-ups and backroom teams are creaking with numbers as every county aims for a high-performance approach.
No one can say they didn't see what was coming. Four years after that MTU study, the GAA's Towards 2034 report – a document to reflect the 150th anniversary of the GAA – proposed the payment of an allowance to inter-county players.
The radical report was never published in the end, but sections of it leaked out and contended that the traditional mileage expenses system was "neither equitable nor fit-for-purpose".
It recommended an agreed allowance for inter-county players instead.
"By 2034, the GAA will have developed a model to recognise the time and effort contributed by senior inter-county players and their respective managers. This will facilitate effective budgeting where senior inter-county players and managers will retain their existing amateur status but have their value to the association, and their enormous commitment to their sport, recognised by a defined and agreed allowance," it read.
That report recognised the demands being placed on players and offered a realisation that something would have to give in terms of how players and backroom teams were reimbursed. But it was never published so other recommendations are unknown.
We may find out over the next couple of years.
For the past three months, convention and congress reports have warned of unsustainability.
Munster Council chairman Ger Ryan called for an urgent review of "all activities at inter-county level", stating that over €35m was spent on preparing inter-county teams in 2023, €11m in Munster alone.
The Templederry man questioned the amounts as well as what is being expected of players.
Connacht GAA CEO John Prenty referenced the €6.7m which Connacht teams spent on preparation in 2023, and asked if a cap on expenditure should be considered "before things go out of control."
In his report to annual congress, the GAA’s director-general Tom Ryan wrote that inter-county set-ups were "professional in all but name" as costs soared to €40m, and warned that spending on teams would hit a ceiling.
In an interview with the GAA's official website on his first day in office, new president Jarlath Burns made it clear that protecting the association’s amateur status through a new committee is a red-letter priority for his term in office.
"What we are spending on preparing our teams is unsustainable. Particularly as we prepare for integration when we'll have other teams to take care of. That has to change and the culture around the preparation of inter-county teams has to change from a number of perspectives," Burns said.
"From a financial perspective, from an amateur status perspective, from the cardiovascular load we are putting on players' perspective, and from a sustainability perspective as well. Because the amount of miles that are being done, the carbon footprint must be absolutely huge.
"There's stress being a county officer and there's stress being a county team manager. There's no point in blaming the county managers because we place the expectation on them to deliver for our county. And if he doesn't deliver we will be asking questions.
"So, it's up to the county manager then to try and do whatever has to be done to get his team across the line and usually that involves increasing resources and spending money. And then the county spends its time chasing behind all of that, trying to organise events and situations whereby they can give the support to the county team that is required.
"I'm not blaming anybody. It's a culture of high-performance that is brilliant and makes us very professional in the sense of wanting to be the best we can be and it fills our stadiums. But even the Premier League with all of its millions and billions has a financial ceiling. And the GAA and its amateur games does not. That's something I want to change."
Aside from restrictions on expenditure, the new committee could look at the number of training sessions held by squads, the size of panels,when teams commence training, and examine if teams are being overtrained.
The possibility of phased and elevated training sessions during the season, rising from pre-season to the league to the championship could also be considered.
With integration proposed in 2027 and a female players charter imminent, the new committee will have much to consider. Just like the MTU report of 10 years ago noted.
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