Wicklow senior football manager Johnny Magee believes that football players should go on strike in response to the so-called Super 8 proposals for Championship football.
The motion to introduce the Super 8 was passed at Congress at the weekend with 76 per cent of the delegates voting to trial the new format for a three-year period.
GPA CEO Dermot Earley spoke out about the new changes on behalf of the inter-county players, stating that there was not proper consultation and that the new format would not help the gulf in standards between the top sides in the country and the weaker counties.
However, the GPA left it late to formulate an opinion on the Super 8 proposals and their views appeared to be sidelined at Congress.
Wicklow boss Magee feels that it’s a move that will only benefit the bigger counties and that it will widen the gap further between the haves and the have nots.
“There’s only so many times you can kick a dog before it bites back,” he said on RTÉ’s Game On.
“It suits the so called top teams because it leads to more exposure and advertising, so they’re not going to complain about it.
“How are you meant to entice the players to play? By 2 April we [Wicklow] will have played 10 games – that’s 10 games in 13 or 14 weeks in the muck of winter football.
“We then played two Championship matches last year on 14 May and on 18 June and then nothing for over five months.”
“They missed out on all the summer and where in the fairness and the equality?
“Croke Park are not looking at the so-called weaker teams. To have a game that you love and to be left out in the cold – that’s exactly what’s happening here.”
Total disrespect®ard 4 club&county players opinion.There is NO game without players! #ALL OUTSTRIKE club&county #timeforactionnotwords
— Johnny Magee (@JohnnyMagee06) February 25, 2017
The former Dublin defender went even further when speaking to the Irish Examiner and claimed that if he was still a player, he go on strike.
"What do they really expect up in Croke Park?," he asked. "The word strike might sound very strong but at the end of the day the players have voiced their opinion and it’s not been listened to. And this is not once, it’s happened two years in a row that the GPA has been ignored.
"I feel the players have been disrespected once too often. If I was still a player, my opinion would be that I will go on strike because that’s twice now they haven’t listened to us.”
"I can’t see it ending in a nice way. And it’s not going to be the fault of players. They feel they’ve voiced their opinion twice now and been shot down. So where does it end?”
"Something has to change. It keeps going round in circles but at the end of the day it’s not going to solve anything."
