Although chances are that last weekend featured a landmark last sighting of football league semi-finals there wasn’t unanimity on the issue. Some, rendered cynical or at least knowing by years of observing these things, felt they wouldn’t want significant wagers on the prospect of the league not undergoing a further revamp in a couple of years and the semi-finals being resurrected.
That’s unlikely to happen for two reasons. Firstly the uncompetitive nature of the two matches wouldn’t of itself be a problem except that underwhelming afternoons are becoming a pattern in these double-bills and are frequently followed by disclaimers of any real interest by the teams.
More importantly the now ardent desire to find additional weekends free of county activity makes it unlikely that the league semi-finals will be deemed in the foreseeable future as a good idea yet again.
If the semi-finals went out with a whimper, the league itself will go out with a bang. Kerry and Dublin have been the best sides in the current competition and have assembled an interesting contemporary back-story during the past five years – to go with all of the ancient legends.
Limited history
It’s been remarked on that the counties have an oddly limited history at this level and the end of the month will be only their third league final but there are other unusual aspects of this year’s competition.
In recent seasons we’ve become familiar with the league being dominated by a small number of All-Ireland contenders. This will be the eighth successive year that the title has been won by Kerry, Dublin or Cork but on the 90th anniversary of the league only 15 All-Ireland champions to date have won the following spring’s league.
The strike rate for going on to win another All-Ireland within the following six months is seven out of 15 to date and it’s an interesting statistical area beyond the mere numbers, as it helps to identify teams who were particularly dominant over a given period.
Whereas three- and four-in-a-row All-Ireland sequences are the conventional metric of greatness, the ability of a team to keep winning consistently through the league after a successful championship has its own resonance.
Again strangely, the previous year's All-Ireland final has only been re-enacted in the league decider on four occasions: Kerry-Kildare (1928), Cavan-Meath (1950), Kerry-Dublin (1977) and Dublin-Donegal (1993). Kerry will be glad to note that on all four occasions the All-Ireland finalists had revenge on the champions.
The final could also set a record for attendance. That stands at 70,126 for the 1964 final between Dublin and Down. More recently Dublin and Donegal in 1993 drew 59,703 to that year’s replayed final.
The Easter 1916 commemoration will probably enhance the number of spectators and it can be noted that the two biggest crowds for league matches were also supplemented by special events. Neither was a final but an ordinary, regulation fixture – in both cases between Dublin and Tyrone – in 2007 for the formal switching on of the Croke Park floodlights and two years later to launch the GAA’s 125th anniversary celebrations.
One fundamental question surrounding the league in recent years is the extent to which it is now overshadowing the championship – not in any sense of hoopla or razzmatazz – but in the simple sense of providing a more meaningful competitive context.
The weather isn't as good and the crowds are smaller but with provincial championships so uncompetitive and predictable outside of Ulster – for instance in Leinster Dublin are All-Ireland favourites at 6 to 4 and the next county from the province deemed most likely to win the Sam Maguire are Kildare at 66 to 1 – the league is the last competitive football some of the contenders will get for a couple of months.
Yet we know that trying to replicate some sort of league format during the summer just won’t attract support.
When trying to understand why counties won’t embrace the concept of graded competition it’s important to remember that there is just more interest in the one-shot championship – qualifiers have no meaning for most Division Four teams – because it’s traditional, against old rivals and neighbours and the pain doesn’t last long.
Waterford footballers haven't had a big day at senior level since landing the mother of all haymakers on Kerry nearly 60 years ago. They attract about 1,700 to a championship match – now that the Munster Council has removed any chance of a crack at Cork or Kerry – but that's box office compared to the graded competition of Division Four in the league in the final match of which their victory over Leitrim was watched by a 'crowd' of 79.
For counties in that position the attraction of a specially sectioned off competition is minimal and current championship structures have to recognise that, however exasperatedly.
Shoe-horning a league that provides higher-calibre matches into the dire weather of the early year and then whiling away the early summer with championships which provide little in the way of competitive quality simply proves that the GAA is not administering a professional sport.
It’s balancing an eco-system of counties with different aspirations and preferences and in that queue of interests, elite counties and the streamlined structures that would better accommodate them must wait in line.
So enjoy the league finals and see you all in August. smoran@irishtimes.com
