Alan Brogan believes the calendar of the Dublin Senior Football Championship needs to be overhauled in the interest of the players.
The first round of the competition took place before Dublin began their Leinster Championship campaign in June.
Brogan represented his club St Oliver Plunkett’s-Eoghan Ruadh at the end of April as they were beaten by Castleknock in the first round.
The second round was completed at the beginning of October, with no games taking place during the summer owing to the senior inter county team being involved in the Championship.
The recently retired Brogan feels this system is senseless and needs to be changed immediately as it is not fair on the club players.
“Life goes on, but it’s probably a bit unfair to ask guys to go back and play club championship a week later.”
“With the replay it couldn’t be avoided, it’s something that needs to be looked at from a club perspective it’s not ideal for guys to come back and have one session and you’re straight into a club championship, then for the inter county footballers to come back after a couple of days celebrating to come back into that level of intensity is unfair on them too.”
Brogan now fully understands the struggles of the players who give up their time to represent the club at senior level, having been involved at inter-county level for over a decade he never fully grasped the issues faced by those who are left frustrated by the structures:
“It’s hard to see when you’re involved with an inter county set-up as I was for years, it’s hard to see the turmoil the club players go through year in, year out like it isn’t fair on them.”
“Even with the All Ireland final replay club players would be set up to play on a certain date all of sudden that’s off again. I think there needs to be a designated time for club championships and that has to be stuck to whether there’s a replay or not.”
Brogan believes the mess could quite easily be fixed, he reckons condensing the calendar would be a big benefit to the clubs:
“The inter-county season needs to be shortened by two weeks, or even four weeks bring the All Ireland final back to August and that gives clubs an extra month, even play a club league off before the summer and the Championship after the summer because playing the first round of the Championship in April and having four of five months then until the next round doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Brogan is not the only one involved in club football in the City eager to see an overhaul, Ballyboden St Endas manager Andy McEntee blasted the current structure after his side were knocked out: “It’s ridiculous, it’s totally unfair. It’s not because we lost, I said the same last year when we came out the right side of the result.”
“For guys to win an All-Ireland and then be asked to play again within a short space of time are just not fair and it’s also not fair on clubs.”
The soon to be Meath manager felt that club players are on the receiving end of shabby treatment as all the focus is on the inter county scene:
“Everything, the GPA, the whole lot, everything is aimed at looking after a half a per cent of the playing population. Not so sure there’s a future for that.”
Alan Brogan was speaking at the launch of the GAA’s Purchase Power. It is a new national purchasing programme, developed to meet the long-standing purchasing needs of the GAA and all its units including Clubs and County Boards.
It uses the collective buying power of the entire GAA to secure bulk discounts on common products and services (like energy, sand, line paint, medals, print, etc.) from nominated suppliers.
For more info check out: http://www.gaa.ie/purchase-power
