Amatuerism v Professionalism. Small budgets v Big budgets. Has the horse bolted?

I see The Examiner has named a lot of refs who failed fitness tests. That seems mad to me. Another instance of amateurs being treated like professionals. Hung out to dry in the media. Very odd. What purpose does it serve to write that amateur refs failed a fitness test, just after christmas... other than fill column inches for the journalist

Plenty of LOI players have jobs. Well over half I'd say.

In rugby young players on their first contract with a province will earn about €40K. Academy players earn circa €8-12K depending on their year. A player who is not an international but on a provincial squad a bit is probably on what? 65k?

Equally, you don't have to see the limits of going pro in the light of having to give up jobs, operate in millions of pounds, and european and world bodies (many of whom go through financial crisis after boom and bust followed by financial crisis by the way.) There are many sports that are pro or semi pro where players still have jobs or the sport itself is not part of an industry worth millions of dollars.

The journey of professionalism is often a juggle from crisis to boom from crisis to boom, no matter what the sport is or the size of the revenue.

With the GAA moving into streaming services and more and more people earning money from it, the prospect of paying players will raise its head again. There's absolutely no harm in having the conversation about what that might look like.

As for the last paragraph of your piece, that's every level of sport. There are always, ALWAYS, the haves and have nots. And there has never been a time in the GAA where some counties have so much more than others in terms of budget.

You say it might lead to resentment or disinterest for the rest who don't make it. But, it might lead to a determination to join the rest. Arguably, the best thing to ever happen to Connacht was when the IRFU tried to get rid of them. Woke them up.

You say, we could only pick a handful of teams to do it. Sure. But that's already the case. Only six county teams have won the hurling since 2000. Two teams, only once. Slightly better in football, maybe.

THE GAA is a cultural institution whose purpose is promote the language, the culture, and sports. That's why it's against professionalism. It's supposed to be above money. The question is being posed has that been lost? And what does the possible professional world look like for the GAA? I'm not advocating professionalism for the gaa but i see no harm in the discussion and see the discussion as inevitable. And it's certainly not new.

Talk The GAA can't do this or can't do that is nonsense to me. 100% it can do it. What that looks like is another thing, especially when things come under the tax radar. Because if as some posters suggest 2,500 for some player's expenses... if the GAA went professional, they'd be on a hell of a lot less I'd imagine. There's lots you can do under the banner of 'amateurism' that flies under the radar - from college fees to funding to cars to yada to yada.

To be absolutely cut throat about it, like a professional business person, you'd take the Munster championship and run with that, and tell other teams you have to meet a criteria of 18,000 attendance for matches and certain amount of jersey sales and sponsorship before you could join the championship and you build from there. It's the only profitable championship in town. And I certainly wouldn't see it as a situation where players would be full time and have no jobs. It would certainly be a nominal fee for appearances. I don't understand why people equate giving up their jobs with professionalism. It's rarely like that. Look at UFC fighters or pro boxers, most have jobs until they sell places out (which for most is never). I really doubt academy players in irish rugby don't have jobs. The pay for irish women's rugby is particularly bad. The Irish soccer team has drawn or been beaten in a few games by teams with carpenters and policemen in them...

But I don't understand why people mention world cups or european soccer, it's just not a model for starting a professional or semi pro sport.

I didn’t suggest that. A poster on Here said that he lived with a few guys who were getting that in expenses out West. Now, not all dressings rooms are ran the same and there are always a few lads getting a bit more from here and there - that includes amateur and professional dressing rooms. While one player might want to go semi pro for such and such a reason, another might not. any grade of professionalism won’t change that kind of dressing room politics

That depends on your understanding of professionalism. The vast majority of experience in professional circuits from tennis to golf to soccer to hockey to polo to darts to snooker to boxing to bowling and on and on is very different from the top 10 or top 100 to the top 1000. And very different from sport to sport…