Will the playoff be held in Croke Park ?

[gspain]

I have to laugh at the assertion that Croke Park used 'alot of taxpayers money.' Here's a few facts:

1. The GAA got E116m of LOTTERY money for the redevelopment of Croke Park. Applications for lottery funds are open to all organisations in Ireland.

2. The Government paid the GAA E25m to use Croke Park during the hosting of the Special Olympics in 2003. Without this they would not have been able to hold the opening & closing ceremonies in the style and fashion that they did.

While no offical data is available, it is believed that this money funded approximately 40% of the redvelopment of Croke Park. The GAA began palnning and redeveloping Croke Park without any public funding.

As a comparison, the FAI and IRFU have been promised E190m of funding (roughly 66%) towards the cost of redeveloping Lansdowne Road. This money has been promised ahead of even planning premission being granted.

The GAA is doing the FAI and the IRFU a favour by allowing them to use their stadium. If the FAI was properly organised they would've ensured that Lansdowne Road was not double-booked for the dates of the play-off once the fixture for the WC qualifiers were made...

Technically you are correct then we should use th eterm "public money". even by your figures €141 million is a lot of "public money".

The conditions for Lansdowne Road are different in that the government gets a stake in Lansdowne Road and will own some of it. Croke Park was paid for without any pre-conditions. Lansdowne Road is being built as a truly national stadium.

The F.A.I. are tenants in Lansdowne Road and could not stop the IRFU from taking up New Zealand's offer of a game in Dublin. Likewise assuming Croke Park is opened up then the F.A.I. won't be able to stop the GAA playing their final in September even if we wanted to play a vital qualifier the day before.

[eirebhoy]

This site is getting so popular we have the media to answer our questions. :) From today's Star:

"Supporters have been logging on to the popular foot.ie fan site in droves to put forward the prospect of a Croke Park playoff.

But last night a GAA spokesperson said their dream was unlikely to become a reality.

GAA chiefs are insisting the builders will have to move into creaky old Lansdowne Road before there's any chance of a Croker match".

BTW - I heard on the news a few days ago that work wasn't planned to start on Lansdowne until 2007. I thought it was 2006. That means at least 2010 before its bloody built.

[geysir]

I heard on the news a few days ago that work wasn't planned to start on Lansdowne until 2007. I thought it was 2006. That means at least 2010 before its bloody built.
According to the schedule the work takes 27 months, thats still 2009.
The info is at this
Link (http://www.lrsdc.ie/home/default.asp), but they don't tell why it costs nearly 4 times to build as Borussia Park (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borussia-Park)

[BobbySands]

Even if Croker was available i believe the stadium management that run croker would price themselves out of the market. I read somewhere that the reason why U2 only played 3 gigs in dublin was beacuse the gaa were looking for more monry for extra gigs.
Seemingly U2's management were amazed with their attitude for example in europe and the uk if you hire a stadium for for a number of nights the rental goes down pending the number of gigs you have but when u2 looked for extra dates the prices the gaa were looking for was more then any of the dates they already had.


If the GAA were in any way responsible for cutting short Bongo's lovefest they deserve our heartfelt gratitude.

[Thunderblaster]

Play the playoff in Anfield and take over the Spion Kop! :D

[TheJamaicanP.M.]

so he could use his irish accent to score some scouse chicks and ride them. amnt i right cosmo ;) :D

Funny coz I have a mate that's the exact same as Cosmo. He went to Liverpool and used his Irish accent to get scouse wans into bed (3 in 2 nights in fact). Dolby126 will forever be associated with those great nights. :D ;)