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Should Dublin Football be split?
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This is going to be a long post. In fact, very long. I hope to include as much information as possible about the current financial situation we have in Dublin, the problems it's caused and the problems it will cause. I also will add a list of solutions. I'm basically summing up this whole thread in one post.
Where it all began
First of all to the beginning. Where did this finance come from? Well, the idea was introduced by the Strategic Review Committee headed by former president Peter Quinn. They looked at the work that was being done by the Dublin County Board and they decided it needed improvement. They saw it as the population being too big for one county board to manage.
Here's what Christy Cooney, who chaired the sub committee that examined Dublin, had to say; "You must remember that there are 1.4 million people in the region and 2,000,000 or more will be there in 20 years time. There's no way one county board is going to manage that. We met all of the units in Dublin last year, as well as the county board. Improvements are necessary and that's not the fault of the board or clubs." Christy's numbers are a bit off, he overestimated both population figures but you get his point.
Peter Quinn stated; "We are recommending sizeable investment in terms of finance and personnel. We recognise that Dublin needs special attention, it's a key strategic matter."
He also said “Dublin is not a national problem, it's a national opportunity'. Meaning it would be mutually beneficial for the GAA and Dublin GAA to join forces. Dublin would increase standards and playing numbers across the county and the GAA would gain increased revenue from the growing popularity of Gaelic Games in Dublin.
Other recommendations from that committee was to split Dublin in two using the liffey as the boundary between north and south.
The Master Plan
From there negotiations began. These negotiations involved the Dublin County Board, the Leinster Council, the GAA and government ministers. They lasted two years and from it the master plan was formed. It's main aims were to divide the county into regions, loosely based on existing local authority areas, and focus its efforts on raising the profile of Gaelic games in schools, improving recruitment for clubs and establishing a structure for developing elite talent.
The strategy involved devolving work to regional areas, where the focus will be sharper on servicing the schools in those regions and identifying the elite talent. Kevin O'Shaughnessy was appointed Strategic Programme Manager. Reporting to him were the regional development officers, the hurling development officers and the games promotion officers.
Sean Kelly, who chaired the joint-committee that agreed the initiatives, said that the plans would 'make Dublin what it should be - the greatest GAA county in Ireland'. But what happened to the Strategic Review Committees other proposal you ask? They suggested higher investment in Dublin but also to split the county in two. Well somehow that was put off the table. Sean Kelly: 'No one's suggesting that Dublin should be divided in two. That's hogwash. No one's saying that for the moment.'
Interesting last line from Sean. Anyway, what did this sizeable investment involve. With huge Dublin GAA supporter Bertie Ahern being the Taoiseach of the day, finding government support for this plan proved easy.
The funding was to come from the GAA, Leinster council and a grant by from the citizens of Ireland, paid through the Irish Sports Council. As we know with the GAA, finding information and full records can sometimes be difficult. The announcement when the plan was launched by Bertie was that Dublin GAA would receive 7 million over 3 years. That is 2.3 million per year. The Dublin GAA released accounts gives a figure of 2.5 million for 2015 and 2.7 million for 2016.
The Figures
However, the GAA annual accounts state a lower figure. As this figure was also used to calculate other statistics that I will post later, we will use the GAA annual accounts figure. The following table is what they received yearly under the Games Development heading in the GAA's accounts.
That's 17,809,863 million between 2005 and 2017. To put that in perspective, I've created the below table to show the 2nd highest amount received by a county and the lowest received by a county every year. The county who received the most and the least changed most years. I couldn't find the accounts for 2014.
As you can see, it was quite low for most counties for many years, it has increased a bit since 2015.
Now I will add graphics that are far superior than mine but will also show the imbalance:
These graphics were created by Shane Mangan, a qualified data analyst among other things. He has worked with the Dublin hurlers in the past. Here's an article which explains how he reached these figures.
http://www.punditarena.com/gaa/gaelic-football/smangan/money-influence-success-gaelic-football/
This one was done by glack, a poster here on boards.
So as you can see, the evidence is damning. The level of funding Dublin GAA receive in comparison to all other counties is astronomical.
Does Money Equal Success
A common example of money equaling success is with British Olympic funding. Here's a good graphic about the UK's increased spending and increased success.
And another:
This one shows the effects income has on medals gained at the Olympics. It has bonus material about the effect being at home has on winning.
The Olympics is sometimes described as an amateur event but we know that's not always the case. So comparing Gaelic Games with the Olympics or any professional sports can be quite difficult. What effect can the level of funding Dublin have received bring to Gaelic Games. What I've done here is compare the trends pre funding to post funding. It's a 13 year spell either side so it can give us a good indication.
As you can see that's pretty damning evidence once again. 14 titles in the 13 before the funding, 51 titles in the 13 years after.
Is it just Games Development money alone causing this upsurge?
The answer is no. The games development money does a lot. As I've stated earlier, it creates elite talent, develops great athletes, leaving the system players are prepared to a professional level and are ready for senior football. This has the knock on effect of gaining a huge number of underage titles but it isn't the main aim of the system.
The other thing pushing this upsurge is the other finance available to Dublin. There's a lot of it. Of course freeing up resources by having your underage machine paid for helps this but the sponsorship money Dublin receives is a vital cog. There was the 6 million Vodafone deal in 2009. With increased success Dublin became even more enticing to sponsors. This led to a bidding war in 2013. AIG won this and with the recent deal added, they're up to 8 million in sponsorship money.
Added to this is a long list of other sponsors. These include; O Neills, Lifestyle sports, Ballygowan, Subaru, Aer Lingus, Energise Sports, Gourmet food parlour, the Gibson Hotel and more.
With this Dublin GAA can prepare their senior teams to a professional level. Anything that's required is available to the hurling and football management teams. They have paid coaches of all hues. Backs coaches, forward coaches, physiologists, psychologists, basketball coaches, Olympic gold medalists, World champion boxers. They are able to provide players with top nutritional content through their meal providers who prepare weekly meals.
This preparation is of course assisted by being trained in some of the best facilities in the country. Multi million euro units. An extra assistance for Dublin senior footballers is that they play almost every championship game at home. As we've seen earlier with the Olympics, home advantage helps a lot. Dublin footballers haven't played a championship game away since 2006.
There's even more advantages. Dublin have a population of 1.4 million. That's one fifth of our islands population. To have that, massive financial resources, top facilities and of course the highly funded development system means that Dublin GAA is in a position where failure seems virtually impossible.
There are some who still argue against that though.
How can anyone say these advantages aren't huge?Population
They say that because Dublin have a higher population, they deserve more money. This is true. They do need more money but the proportion they get currently far outweighs their population requirements, especially compared to every other county who receive far less. It must be remembered that having a greater population is an advantage. Leitrim would definitely attest to that.Competition with other sports
There are many sports in Dublin, there's competition with Leinster rugby and soccer. This is true in many other counties too. Kids play a wide variety of sports in every county. Rugby is massive in areas of Munster, Ulster and Connacht. Other counties have other issues also, like in Ulster, many don't want anything to do with Gaelic games. Emigration is a bigger issue outside of Dublin, as is moving from your home county to another.This is a one off team
Defenders of this say that the Dublin senior footballers are only a one off team, once they're gone everything will be back to normal.
First of all this ignores the huge improvements made at underage level in both hurling and football and the senior hurlers. As my earlier graphic shows, Dublin have won 51 titles since the funding began. That isn't a one off, that is a continuing trend of success in all grades, at all age levels and it's showing no sign of slowing down.
Also, they site one off players such as Cluxton, Connolly, Flynn and Brogan. Those players were there when Dublin were getting destroyed in the later stages of the championship. Things changed when the conveyor belt of talent arrived. That conveyor belt is still in motion. Obviously we can't ignore that 3 of those players aren't starters anymore, they don't seem to miss them too much.If it's about money why haven't the hurlers won more?
What level did the hurlers come from? Before the funding the got destroyed by Offaly, lost to Laois by 4 goals and lost to Westmeath. Since then they have won a National hurling league and a Leinster title, they're things the counties that were at their level can only dream about. Aided by the many excellent underage teams, the Dublin senior hurlers are currently in a very healthy state. Competitive at the top level and with a great chance of making more strides in the next few years.
In comparison the Dublin footballers were at a higher level before the funding. The increase in standards is similar, just from different starting points.Football was always dominated by a few
This is true of the past. Kerry and Dublin were dominant for a long time and they will always be competitive at the top level. Things changed between the 70's and the 90's though. Ulster counties were coming towards the end of 'the troubles' and were making a breakthrough. Standards in other counties raised. In Leinster for example. Prior to the funding Leinster titles were won by Westmeath and Laois. Meath, Kildare and Offaly before that.
It was wide open and competitive. All Ireland's were won by Galway, Meath, Armagh, Tyrone. Kerry and Dublin were also winning things but it was a vibrant competition.Other counties get funding too
Yes other counties get funding too but, as the earlier images show, no where near the level of Dublin's funding. What we are not including is money for stadiums, centres of excellence etc. That's because if we included that, Dublin would be farther ahead in terms of financial support given.It's just jealousy
I'm sure there are some people that are jealous. Who doesn't want to see your county win lots of titles? I think for the most part though, it's a case of unfairness that irks people. Why should one county be getting this special treatment?Why punish a team for being too good, it's up to others to catch up?
As I've already pointed out, the huge financial imbalance makes that almost impossible. Examples are used such as Kilkenny in hurling and Kerry in football. Neither of these had the advantages Dublin have. Dublin GAA is in an unprecedented position. The long list of advantages has never and probably will never be seen in the GAA. Also as been pointed out, it's not just the senior footballers but all levels and grades that's the issue. It's unfair and anti the ethos of the GAA to have a county operating with this level of finance.What issues does and will the financial doping cause?
This is already having a major affect. The Leinster championship is dead. Dublin have won every title bar one since the funding began. Other counties are demoralised, players aren't bothering playing, attendances will drop, even Dublin supporters aren't showing up in big numbers.
Now the only teams that can compete with Dublin are teams with money. This in itself is another huge issue. Financial clout shouldn't be the way counties compete.
In hurling, people are delighted to see another county compete but why just Dublin? Why not the other counties that were at the same level?
There are more and more calls for teams to be thrown into a B championship in football. The super 8's is another step towards the bigger counties having their own championship leaving the others behind. This is very dangerous. That will result in the lowering of standards across a huge range of counties. Like we see in the hurling championship, the Joe McDonagh cup gets very little coverage, it's very hard to step up to the top level. If we have the football equivalent of the Joe McDonagh, it will leave the same amount of teams able to win All Ireland's. I.e very little.
There's also the danger of the game turning professional. This would only be viable in very few counties. Not to be overly dramatic but, if something isn't done to stop this financial doping it will be very damaging to Gaelic Games. It will be very hard to recover from.
The SolutionsLeave it the same
We could leave everything the same and watch as counties struggle to get any finance they can muster together to try to remain on Dublin's coattails. This isn't sustainable.Evenly divide the development funding
This is an obvious option but shouldn't it have been done at the start? After 13 years of financial doping, Dublin are so far ahead of other counties. It would take a long time to catch up. Plus, Dublin GAA are fighting against any reduction in the funding they receive.Split Dublin in two
This was the original proposals from the Strategic Review Committee. Dublin GAA took their financial and planning recommendations but refused to entertain the splitting suggestion. It's a case of having your cake and eating it too.Split Dublin into four
Dublin is already divided into the four council areas for coaching and development purposes. It wouldn't take much to organise this. The financial doping has been ongoing for 13 years now. Four competitive teams with large populations is a very viable option and the teams should be well able to compete.Suspend Dublin until other counties get a piece of the pie
This might be more palatable to some Dublin supporters. Dublin will be suspended until other counties get to finance a production system for their own players. Dublin will return in say 5 years and hopefully on a more equal footing.
My recommendations
For what it's worth, this is what I hope will happen.
I hope plans are placed to split Dublin into 4. Dublin City with a population of over 500,000, Dun Laoighaire/Rathdown with a bit over 200,000, Fingal with almost 300,000 and South Dublin with slightly less. These are four viable counties with the population to compete. The plan has worked, standards have improved in all these areas. Playing numbers are up and Gaelic Games has grown. There's no reason these teams can't compete at the top level and it will give more players a chance to play inter county football and hurling.
That's a start, from there every county should be given equal opportunity to compete. What do I mean by this? Well, like the plan for Dublin, it should involve a Strategic Planning Officer with regional development officers, the hurling development officers and the games promotion officers reporting to him.
They are under strict guidelines to promote hurling and football in their counties. There will be targets that have to be met and standards that need to be reached. No counties will be allowed give favourable treatment to one code over the other.
Obviously the level of funding won't be exactly the same for each county. Everyone will get what's needed to cover their population base. It will be fair, unlike the system we have now.
What must happen now
If this is left up to the various county boards then nothing will change. Dublin county board will never voluntarily change or give up the money. Most of the county boards in other counties are plain useless. It's up to us in our clubs to stand against it. It will do serious damage to our games. We have to make as much noise as possible. We probably need big names to voice their concern. Get this covered on the Sunday Game, get it onto the radio, get it into the newspapers.
This isn't a good thing for anyone, including Dublin supporters. Winning is nice but knowing that it was done through financial means taints it. This isn't what Gaelic Games is all about. It's an amateur sport, let's go back to that again.
I think this sums everything up. If anyone disagrees with any of this then they are free to argue politely. Others may have other ideas or other solutions. I'd love to hear them. Any abuse or deflection will be ignored however.
That's the end of it now.
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Unfortunately, he is looking at the wrong county. As TrueGael has pointed out, Kerry have won the last four minor football titles in a row, a near impossible feat at that level. Dublin are nowhere, and it is clear they should have spent their money hothousing young players as Kerry did by building their centres of excellence with state money, rather than what Dublin did, widening participation to give every young child in the county a chance to play our national games.
Dontmatter is chasing up the wrong tree, he should be looking at Kerry to see what they are doing.
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The problem with your analysis is that the money only started in 2005, so the first lot of 7-year olds are only 20 now, and given it would have taken time to set it up and find the right kids (if the intention was to make a new generation of kids), the best of the lot are only between 16 and 18 and should therefore be winning all round them at minor level, I mean that is what is happening, isn't it? 0
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DONTMATTER wrote: »
If you look again at the figures, you will see that the real change is in Leinster. Between 2005 and 2018, Dublin won less national titles than Leinster teams did in the previous period you reference.
In that earlier period, the excellence of Leinster teams prevented Dublin getting out of Leinster and winning national titles. With the collapse of Leinster teams, and Meath in particular, the path to Leinster titles is clear and unchallenged (giving Dublin a free run and a large increase) and the average number won by Leinster champions is relatively unchanged, until the last five years when an exceptional Dublin team is now challenging as the best of all time.
As I have pointed out already, of the 20 players used by Gavin in the 2013 All-Ireland final, 14 have already seen championship action this summer, with O'Gara likely to get a few minutes at some stage, 3 more - Brogan, Connolly and O'Carroll would have seen action only for injury or travel. The other two have retired. 2 of the unused substitutes from 2013 - Fitzsimons and Daly have also seen action, making it a remarkable continuity.
If your premise was really true, then it would be Dublin, not Kerry winning minor All-Irelands all the time and many more of the 2013 senior team would have been forced out.
The reality is the money has helped participation rates among weaker kids all over the city by giving them and at the same time, a truly exceptional group of players are making history as the GOAT.
Unfortunately, bitterness and jealousy are blinding too many to the greatness of this Dublin team.0 -
DONTMATTER wrote: »
If you look again at the figures, you will see that the real change is in Leinster. Between 2005 and 2018, Dublin won less national titles than Leinster teams did in the previous period you reference.
Nonsense, the improvement is in every bracket at national, Leinster, underage, hurling and football. You’re Cherry picking and forming a narrative that doesn’t exist.0 -
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