No Football or Rugby at Croke Park

[Donal81]

Interesting reading on www.anfearrua.ie - main GAA site

http://www.anfearrua.ie/ViewSectionD...asp?docid=1320

http://www.anfearrua.ie/ViewSectionDetail.asp?docid=50

I think it was D81 who recommended the site.

If the main opposition is that football and rugby will benefit to the detriment of the GAA from opening it up. Could somebody articulate the anti argument or provide a decent link to it. Most of it seems to be knocking the pro opening argument. There is also the argument that the "pot of gold" won't be as lucrative as predicted but surely that is up for discussion.

BTW I do accept fully that it is the GAA's stadium and that there can be no CPOs or retrospective pre-conditions put on the public money given to the GAA. It is the GAA and GAA alone who should make the decision. However I also along with the 53% in the Indo poll believe the GAA should never get another cent of public money if they keep it closed and that any organisation that sponsors the GAA in such circumstances will go way down in my estimation and I will actively seek to support competitiors.

I recommended the site because it's the biggest one, I think, it gets about 2000 hits a day or something. I'm not sure how representative it is but it doesn't hurt to lean over the fence. The reason it came up is that its poll kind of defeats the notion that the GAA leadership is against soccer and rugby while 'decent' ordinary GAA folk are all for it. Also, I would reckon that the users are fairly young.

It would be miserable if we all had to troop across to Cardiff for every home game, not to mention pretty humiliating. Here's hoping they open it.

[Thunderblaster]

Ehh, I don't think I've ever heard someone from the West of Ireland use the word 'ruffian' - that's an old England word.

The West of Ireland translation would be "shoccer ish a gaisurs game played by amadans and rugby ish an amadans game played by gaisurs." Definitely would sound good in an American made Pig in the Parlour movie set in the wild backward surroundings of Connemara. Would sound funny if an American actor can come out with that line in that real boggy, culchie accent.
No, I'm a bit better at vocabulary than that. Even Connacht has some sophisticated guys but I aint one of them.
This is the province that farmers would sell their tractors to the G.A.A. and soccerheads have to compete with the "mighty" institution of the local G.A.A. club to field teams in local matches. This is where you, allegedly, see the real dirty politics of the G.A.A. It is known that, allegedly, G.A.A. teams when they have finals, ban their players from playing soccer. That is the denial of a child to have the freedom of choice of what to play if these reports are true.

[Thunderblaster]

If we made up congress on the rule 42 motion, it is open house to soccer and rugby, going by our fair and democratic opinion poll.

[Thunderblaster]

Congrats lads, democracy has spoken in the opinion poll. The liberals won the argument and the diehards needs to listen to the majority.

[Donal81]

Congrats lads, democracy has spoken in the opinion poll. The liberals won the argument and the diehards needs to listen to the majority.

Who are you referring to? Who are the liberals and who are the diehards?

[Thunderblaster]

Who are you referring to? Who are the liberals and who are the diehards?

The twenty two that bothered to vote which is a flea to an elephant in terms of the number of eligible voters. The vote would obviously carry more weight if it was carried out with 3.5 million people. The liberals are the people that would like to see Croke Park opened up to soccer and rugby and the die hards would wish to retain the status quo on Rule 42. Back to the real world, it looks certain that Rule 42 will be retaine in its current format at Congress as all the Ulster counties will vote no and so will Limerick, which is one of the more tolerant in sporting attitudes. By the ways, soccer was played in Croke Park (Then known as Jones Road Stadium) before the GAA bought it in 1913.

[JANESBOROFAN]

as i don't know how to post a link i would direct people who want to hear the pro rule 42 side of the argument put very powerfully to go to premierview and read mulcair on the messageboard and his article on the site.it encapsulates nearly all of the reasons why a lot of gaa members want rule 42 to stay.

[Superhoops]

as i don't know how to post a link i would direct people who want to hear the pro rule 42 side of the argument put very powerfully to go to premierview and read mulcair on the messageboard and his article on the site.it encapsulates nearly all of the reasons why a lot of gaa members want rule 42 to stay.

you can read this article on www.premierview.ie/corabhln's%20column.htm

[blobbyblob]

By the ways, soccer was played in Croke Park (Then known as Jones Road Stadium) before the GAA bought it in 1913.

And Gaelic Football and Hurling was played in Wembley!!! Weren't the English FA great to allow in the foreign sports. (My own father played there as it happens - Gaelic Football)

These "diehards" have to get their head out of the sand.


A few notes....
- The opening of Croke Park to other sports is not a threat to the GAA. The GAA recorded record profits last year for Croke Park.
- The GAA as an organisation will not crumble to its foundations if a Total 90 ball touches its hallowed surface.
- The GAAs "competitors" will have a stadium in a couple of years time. What happens to the GAA then? Does it crumble?
- A sizeable majority of Rugby/Soccer fans are GAA contributors/players!
- A sizeable contingent of both Rugby/Soccer international players have represented their clubs and counties and clubs with equal pride. Kevin Moran, Niall Quinn, Duffer, O Gara and Eric Miller in more recent times. Im sure the list goes on and on.
- While GAA facilities have provided great amenities to communities for over 100 years, these amenities are provided and sustained by the people of the communities.
- You are no less Irish by playing "foreign sports."
- Croke Park LTD or the Central Council does not have a money printing machine. Either directly through development drawes, match gates or indirectly through taxation, the people of Ireland have built Croke Park, Semple Stadium, Pairc Ui Chaoimh, Fitzgerald Stadium, The Gaelic Grounds, Nowlan Park, Wexford Park, Walsh Park, Casement Park, Hyde Park. Be under no illusions where the money came from.
- GAA supporters do not cower in bomb shelters during foreign sport spectacles and wait for the evil to pass.(Although some of the past presidents may?!?!)
- God knows, the opening of Croker may make the GAA a few friends.
- Failure to open the gates wont kill soccer/rugby off for good but it will be written in the history books that the GAA turned their own away citizens when the came looking.
- The GAA's bargaining power will not/has not been lessened by any one individual. U2 were on the receiving end of this not so long ago when a third date was cancelled due to the highest price for venue rental on their World Tour at 1,000,000 euros a night.
- Soccer is a partionist sport on this island? Although it is a nice ideology, the GAA is about 80 years and 2 amendments to the constitution too late. Northerm Ireland is a seperate country with its own identity. The only partition on this island in sporting terms is the one created by certain aspects of the GAA.

[TheJamaicanP.M.]

Fair play to ya Blobbyblob. That's a great post.

It's hard to add to what you've just said apart from my need to comment on the ironies of the GAA's "principles". The man who disgusts me most is Jack Boothman. The former president continues to get involved when other people his age are happy to sit in their slippers by their fireside. It would have served Boothman better if he had rid the organisation of the blatant sectarianism that makes it extremely difficult for people of his own creed to partake in Gaelic games. Rather than reinforcing the ban on Irishmen playing soccer and rugby in Croke Park, it would have suited Boothman better if he had stopped members of his own organisation putting guns on the streets of Belfast. When contacted by the media last year with regard to the possible opening of Croke Park, Boothman was unavailable for comment. He was in the U.S. at the time watching a GAA all-stars match in a baseball ground. Ironic or what. Its the likes of Boothman and Joe McDonagh that make me feel ashamed to be Irish.

[lopez]

...A sizeable contingent of both Rugby/Soccer international players have represented their clubs and counties and clubs with equal pride. Kevin Moran, Niall Quinn, Duffer, O Gara and Eric Miller ...

... It would have served Boothman better if he had rid the organisation of the blatant sectarianism that makes it extremely difficult for people of his own creed to partake in Gaelic games...

The interesting name is Miller who having been a schoolboy at Wesley College and possessing an un-Irish name - like Boothman himself - would not have been the likely candidate to have played an sport under GAA control.

[CollegeTillIDie]

blobbyblob

Spot on about Jones's Road. Bohs played their before 1901

[CollegeTillIDie]

What the boy O'Banton said really.

It'll be interesting to see the GAA response to a formal invitation to share NI's proposed new super stadium, Pairc na Long Kesh

Well said because Pairc Na Long Kesh is going to be open to all sports and the Ulster Council of the GAA, the boys who brought Ulster Says No( to groundball and rugger in Croker) into Irish culture , have welcomed this development. We may even see Ulster Finals of bogball taking place in Staid Na Maze at Pairc Na Long Kesh in years to Come.

[Thunderblaster]

Exclusive: UEFA are interested in holding a Champions League Final in the hallowed ground of Croke Park, reports of ex-GAA men turning in their graves, the pro Rule 42 lobby are shocked and stunned by the news. Will the pro Rule 42 muppets finally bow before God and beg for forgiveness for hanging onto such a stupid rule and embrace soccer in Croke Park for the first time in over ninety years as an act of reconcilliation. Remember, Pope John Paul II played soccer and it was never a "foreign sport" to him.

[Thunderblaster]

Hail the Glorious Delegates that voted to open Croke Park to soccer for the first time in approx 95 years. Today was a victory for democracy, a victory for Ireland, a victory for soccer fans, a victory for GAA moderates and it sends a powerful message to the bigots! Welcome to the 21st Century!!