Jim Gavin’s positivity about the work of his Football Review Committee is unforced and vibes like an energy.
Here he is, the man whose enthusiasm and organisational acumen made history on the field now dedicating his abilities to solving the problems of what has become the GAA’s problem child.
Football is by far the bigger of the association’s main games in terms of its widespread appeal but it is also an unprepossessing sibling, attracting despairing glances and disparaging words.
Is there a sport in the world whose spectators and pundit class are so out of love with its reality?
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Hurling occasionally attracts the disapproval of its style commissars, going back to the first stirrings of the running game, but it requires such skill to perform so many of its basic functions that the sense of wonder is rarely entirely absent.
Football feels like it has been relentlessly processed to get rid of any fibre that might prompt the excitement of contested possession and unpredictability – becoming as a result bland and lacking in nutrition.
The All-Ireland final attracted dismissiveness on one hand – as a generic display of modern football – and condemnation on the other, directed at the teams. Maybe a little unfair in that Galway simply didn’t play well, whereas Armagh, survivors of enough hard-luck stories to make them distrust anything except the final scoreboard, just wanted to be ahead – but you sense that non-partisans have just about had enough.
Coincidentally, Gavin, during his media briefing on Tuesday, made refence to the final and how there hadn’t been a single shot at goal over the 70 minutes.
There was some irony that Jarlath Burns, who made it his business to appoint Gavin to lend critical care to football, ended up at his first All-Ireland presenting the Sam Maguire to his own county, which many people take as a sign of the game’s rude health.
The FRC and its high-powered collective of former managers, players and development professionals have spared no effort to take soundings.
This exercise told them that people wanted as a priority more one-on-one contests as opposed to players being smothered in a blanket defence, and disliked above anything else cynical play and indiscipline.
The themes that the committee has considered – Gavin was adamant on Tuesday that there are as yet no concrete proposals but simply possible solutions that are under consideration – are sufficiently well thought out to be trialled.
Primary in the ideas to change the way the game is played is firstly the 40-metre scoring arc, that will be worth two points to anyone kicking the ball over the bar from outside its boundary. That, together with the revalued four-point goal, is hoped to create a dilemma for defences.
Do you push out to contest the long shots or stick close to your goal with its enhanced vulnerability?
Then there is the requirement for both teams to have three players within each 65-metre line, which creates a little less congestion.
It was interesting to hear how in the sandbox trial matches so far, players and teams had adapted to the new circumstances. Celbridge in Kildare were the only club to be involved in two such outings and, according to Gavin, they were much improved the second time, getting to grips with putting a fourth player into the 65m area so that there could be some movement in and out.
They also tried to create scoring chances from outside the 40m arc. In general, it was observed that teams didn’t appear to chase the four-point goals, although two quick such scores transformed one of the matches before half-time.
All very interesting but there are familiar clouds on this horizon. Go back through recent decades and look at the number of eminent professionals who have given up vast amounts of time pro bono to help the GAA with various issues, and then consider the outcomes.
It would be less than controversial to suggest that, for most of these public-spirited individuals, the overall experience was a disappointment.
Whether it’s the burnout subcommittee of another former Dublin manager, Dr Pat O’Neill, 17 years ago, or the most recent iteration of a Football Review Committee, chaired by the late Eugene McGee in 2012, the acceptance of the odd proposal couldn’t disguise the frustration at how many other equally well-framed ideas bit the dust.
You come with an integrated suite of measures, which are then selected like items on an a la carte menu.
There is no doubting the momentum of the current FRC and the speedy, yet thorough, manner of its workings, but the danger is simply in the process.
According to Gavin, there was a very good reaction to his ideas when Central Council was briefed on Saturday and that’s encouraging. But having to bring the agenda to a special congress and go to work on the delegates is a different sales job to briefing small groups of ‘stakeholders’.
Fingers crossed that it works out but is it really the best way to undertake these important reforms? If a critical mass of administrators and practitioners can reach agreement on the merit of these proposals when they are finally made concrete, should there not be a guaranteed period to bed in and take effect?
By all means let congress have a say but only after there has been a proper interval to evaluate.
One long-serving official said that he hoped the FRC wouldn’t come with too many proposals, because that spooks delegates and generally leads them to regard motions as clay pigeons.
The current FRC is the latest in a parade of hard-working, benevolently disposed experts to put their experience at the service of the GAA. Let’s hope this time it’s different.
