Connacht Council secretary John Prenty has criticised the GPA for a lack of consistency in relation to player welfare.
Prenty’s comments come just days after Ulster Council’s Brian McAvoy also took aim at the players’ body – with both provincial councils frustrated by the GPA’s influence in removing the pre-league competitions from the 2025 calendar.
Writing in his annual report, Prenty said: “The GPA are not fans of the pre-season competitions and have called for their demise in the past.
“Unfortunately they have got their way for 2025 when in tandem with Ard Chomhairle they have succeeded in having all pre-season competitions discontinued for one year.
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“Their theory is based on the fact that pre-season competitions are having a detrimental effect on player welfare. Maybe when next they conduct a survey with the players they might find out how many times intercounty teams have trained pre the return to train date and particularly how many challenge games have been played in December.
“The irony of the GPA concerns about player welfare has been the recent kite they flew around the return of the International Rules. Consistency is futile.
“With the recent Special Congress decision to approve all of the Football Review Committee motions surely the pre-season competitions had a valuable role to bring everybody, players, managements, referees and supporters up to speed with the new rules in a less competitive environment. It has been an opportunity lost.”
Prenty also reiterated his stance on what he sees as excessive demands on talented young players.
“An issue of concern at minor level and indeed at academy level is the amount of training and S&C that the players are currently being exposed to,” he said.
“We must remember that those players are in essence children and as an association we must ensure that they are not expected to adhere to adult norms.
“Even though it is widely denied, I have no doubt that many children at U17 and academy level are being silently discouraged to fully commit to their school or club underage teams and that the only game in town is at the county level.
“The reality is that less than 2 per cent of our players will ever participate at intercounty level. All of our underage players must be allowed give full commitment at schools and club level. Anything else is a bonus which may or may not happen.”
Meanwhile, Munster Council CEO Kieran Leddy believes the GAA should be pushing for inclusion in the use of more shared sporting facilities in the future.
Writing in his annual report, Leddy also argued against a perception that the GAA benefits from Government funding more than other sports.
“The GAA needs to become part of the conversation around municipal facilities in urban areas,” wrote Leddy. “In other words, multi-sport facilities built by funding from the taxpayer need to include facilities for the playing of Gaelic games.
“In the past, our desire to build our own facilities was very strong, but in the modern world, this is not always practical. Land in urban areas is scarce now, so facilities need to take on a multi-sport model.
“So good has the GAA been at providing its own facilities, that local authorities have built municipal facilities that have excluded Gaelic games, simply because the playing areas provided in these municipal facilities is too small to cater for Gaelic games.
“A notion is being peddled that the Government has put far too much money into Gaelic games to the detriment of other sports. This is not true. Government funding over the years has been a fraction of what the GAA itself has invested in its own facilities.
“The current County Centres of Excellence in Munster, for example, have been built with minimal Government support and have been mainly funded by the GAA.”
The report also revealed the Munster senior hurling championship generated record gate receipts of €6.795 million in 2024 – up €1.4 million on 2023. That figure accounted for 85 per cent of Munster’s gate receipts last year.
Leddy added that competition costs had increased and while acknowledging the hurling championship remained Munster’s jewel in the crown and was ‘riding the crest of a wave at the moment’, he highlighted concerns around their provincial football championship.
“Our senior football competition chugged along almost under the radar,” he stated. “Without Corcaigh challenging for honours at the game’s top table, we are relying on all too rare upsets for variety.”
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