Head of Gaelic Players’ Association backs review committee’s bid to make football more enjoyable to play and watch

Gaelic Players’ Association chief Tom Parsons has revealed that watching the Football Review Committee go about its business has been eye-opening in terms of how “professional” and “comprehensive” they were.
The GPA head is supportive of the Football Review Committee’s (FRC) drive to make football more enjoyable to play and watch, an ambition that tallied with the results of an intercounty players’ survey last month.
Parsons said that when asked to what extent they agreed with making football more progressive, exciting and dynamic, 49 per cent of 1,073 county players strongly agreed or agreed. Just 21 per cent disagreed, while 30 per cent were neutral. Explaining away the 51 per cent who either disagreed or were on the fence, Parsons said an overall desire for change was “backed up with the conversations we’ve had too”.
Speaking at a media briefing in advance of this weekend’s interprovincial tournament at Croke Park, which is being used as a vehicle to test out the Football Review Committee’s suite of new rules, Parsons also spoke of two significant “red flags” raised by the GPA.
The first related to the fact that this Friday’s opening double header of games falls on a weekday, forcing many players to take time off work. It was also deemed less than ideal that all teams will play on consecutive days, another player welfare issue.
Parsons said that while both of those issues were brought up, they ultimately received assurances from the Football Review Committee that it was a “once-off” arrangement and that players would be rotated across the two days to mitigate against fatigue.
“We absolutely have raised those two red flags with the GAA and out of respect for the work that the FRC are doing, I think the one compromise…it is a once-off, they have done a significant consultation and they’ve put in measures to reduce the load on players by extending the panels and having somebody tracking what every player is doing,” said Parsons.
“We certainly don’t want to see a player playing the full 60 minutes on Friday and another 40 minutes on Saturday.”
The professionalism of the Football Review Committee may have helped assuage the GPA’s fears. “If every committee was able to get through the level of consultation that the FRC has, Gaelic games would be a great place,” said Parsons.
On the prospect of the interprovincial championships commanding an annual autumn slot, Parsons shook his head. “What we don’t want to do is reduce the competition load by removing the preseason competitions and then just fill that space with another competition that puts load on,” he said, referencing the recent decision to postpone January’s preseason competitions.
Some managers have been critical of culling the preseason tournaments, particularly in a year when new rules are coming in. Parsons said he understood that frustration but pointed again to the player welfare aspect. “We stand over the data, the position on player welfare and players returning to training on December 7th and [needing] six weeks of work before a competitive game,” said the former Mayo midfielder.
Parsons also responded to the recent comments of GAA president Jarlath Burns who predicted “a debate on whether we should put managers on contract because it is nearly a full-time job”, raising the possibility of formalising payments to managers in the future.
Parsons said players would not object. “We did ask players in our government grant survey, do you think intercounty managers should be compensated for their time? 92 per cent said yes.”
He said the reality is that managers are already “being compensated” as things stand, through under-the-counter payments. He noted players aren’t against managers being rewarded financially but stressed “that doesn’t mean players want pay-for-play” themselves.
Asked if the GAA could afford to pay managers, and at what levels of the game they would receive the pay, Parsons declined to get into the debate but reiterated that from the perspective of the players it would not be an issue.
“The GAA do pay 350 coaches, games development officers around the country who do incredible work and they’re professional coaches. They work with development squads, intercounty, underage, grassroots, clubs and schools.
“So look, that’s all positive. So in some way the GAA are already invested in coaches and the games development officer administration. We know it’s already happening. Players are calling for transparency and the recognition that intercounty managers are putting in considerable time. That’s just the facts that we have, and I want to be open and transparent about that.”