From the moment Jim Gavin was announced as the head of Jarlath Burns’ Football Review Committee, football fans have allowed themselves to dream of a better sport to watch. And now we find ourselves where we are – we don’t know what we have yet, but it’s massively exciting.
I can say now that it feels like I might have suspended my critical thinking at various times throughout this process. Every time I felt moved to point out a flaw in the FRC’s thinking, I reminded myself that these men knew more about football than any other group in the history of the game, had dedicated an extraordinary amount of time to this project, had played their sandbox games, and had adjusted their thinking accordingly.
Even now, as I run through the rules as they’ve been brought in, I can’t help but think this idea of a goalkeeper being allowed to receive the ball in the opponents’ half will be a bit of a problem . . . but I can live with it.
It will create an overlap in the attacking half for the team in possession, but the keeper will have to come out and run past three members of the opposition before he can even touch the ball. How often will keepers actually involve themselves in the first 50 or 55 minutes of the game? We’re about to find out, I suppose.
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Seán Moran in these pages yesterday outlined the debt of gratitude that the FRC owe to previous committees charged with improving the game. Many of the motions passed at Congress last Saturday had been heard before. But they were suggested at a time when Gaelic football fans were not ready for them.
A good idea is always a good idea, even if sometimes you have to wait for your audience to catch up. The footballing spectacle had degraded to such an extent that people were willing to try pretty much anything to help it course-correct.
And there was the also the power of the committee itself. Sometimes the medium is the message. The committee was announced on Jarlath Burns’ first weekend in charge, with Jim Gavin at its head and with a stellar list of names underneath him. It put people on notice. When they talked about being given a mandate for change, people believed it in their bones.
If you consider the fact that game rules can only be changed in years ending in 0 or 5, you also have to acknowledge that maybe Jarlath Burns won the presidency in the correct year too. Instead of taking over in the midst of Covid, he saw a 9-month window to do something genuinely revolutionary, and he took it. It was a confluence of events that led to the motions flying through Congress last Saturday.
But there is a wider point to be made about how this has been handled by the GAA. The association saw a problem, they put a small but massively talented group of people in charge with free rein to think openly, and in less than a year they effected a massive change in how the most popular game in the country is played. They weren’t afraid of tackling the big problem with big ideas.
If Congress had decided to flex its muscles, to vote a selection of the motions down just to let everyone know who was still in charge, it would have been devastating to the FRC, but also devastating to the idea of decisive leadership in the GAA.
What the last nine months have shown is that the oil tanker of GAA democracy can actually be turned around. So what should we do with this information?
If I was a hurling person appalled by the idea that half the country doesn’t play the sport, and doesn’t get the chance to play the sport, then this should be a clarion call.
When many of us despaired for Gaelic football over the last 10 years, we tinkered around the edges of the problem. We suggested one rule-change, or two rule-changes, with the constant nagging voice in the back of your head saying “remember, this has to get past Congress, so slowly . . . slowly”. But 48 enhancements to the game sailed past last Saturday. Let’s not say that blue-sky thinking doesn’t exist or can’t work in the GAA ecosystem.
If hurling people truly believe that every child in Ireland should get a chance to play our national game, you have your template. Maybe you think you need to wait for a ‘hurling man’ to be voted in as president . . . but I have a feeling you’ve a better chance with Jarlath Burns in charge.
Maybe you don’t believe there’s a person with a similar level of universal respect to Jim Gavin in your sport (I have my doubts). Or maybe there isn’t that near-universal desire for change that Gaelic football fans have felt harden over the last decade?
Maybe there are enough hurling people out there happy enough with how the game is trucking along in its nine or 10 strong counties to ensure this thing isn’t driven on. If that’s the case, we should admit it and forget about the idea of growing the sport.
But if you disagree, then now’s the time to act. You don’t know where nine months might take you.
