Emmet Moloney writes for the 'The Irish Farmers Journal' and is a former sports columnist with 'The Kerryman'.

County managers are allegedly over rewarded but good luck to all of them. If someone is rewarding them, it must be because they think they are worth it, says Emmet Moloney...

This is now officially the GAA “silly season”. For the uninitiated, a silly season is when there is nothing much to report, so those stories that usually wouldn’t raise an eyebrow become front-page news. In other words, the silly season is a perfect time to announce your retirement, a strike or your annual attempt to “crack down” on payments to managers.

Of course there is plenty happening on the GAA front. There are county finals up and down the country, provincial championships and, of course, the International Rules series and Mícheál’s final farewell.

In reality, there is even more going on beneath the surface. We mightn’t hear much on the subject – such is our preoccupation with the Government and the banks – but clubs and counties are all under severe financial pressure. It might be time to talk about it.
Let’s take counties first.

I am friendly with three intercounty managers (no names). All three are planning for 2011. You’re probably thinking the priority is a weights programme in the gym for winter, long-term injured or maybe that week in Portugal for some warm weather training?
You’d be wrong. All three are focused on one only thing right now and that’s the financial welfare of their squad. Will they still be here come spring, or will they have emigrated? Can I get some of them jobs?

Certain progressive counties have formed committees whose only duty is to find work for players. They are to be applauded and encouraged, for theirs is not an easy task.
Once upon a time, a company would love to have a county star working for them. It was good for business, and the publicity was welcome. As a result, there was a plethora of hurlers and footballers who worked in banks or – the favourite job with perks – “as a rep”.

That’s gone now. Having a player on your books was a quid pro quo arrangement. He schmoozed customers while you turned a blind eye to his training and team commitments on your time. Where once players ignored potential work perks, like overtime and promotion, they are now going to ignore the GAA. It is inevitable.

The Dublins, Corks, Galways and the like just might be able to get away with it. They at least have a bigger pond to fish from for players. But the Leitrims and Donegals of this world are about to be put to the pin. Progress in places like Carlow, Wicklow, Kildare and Clare is under real threat.

On the club front, the situation is also tenuous. The lifeblood of rural Ireland is the club, the clubhouse and the pitch. In recent times, the number of fantastic developments that went on in GAA clubs was perhaps the best sporting benefit of the Tiger. Trouble is a lot of them still have to be paid for.

There is one upside. Can you imagine any of our banks closing down a GAA club because of debt owed to it? Me neither. So we’ll still have a roof over our heads, but running a GAA club is a costly venture. That has to be paid for in these “funding challenged” times, and for most that means the Club Lotto. The capital debt can be managed, but the day to day is now a problem.

This means clubs must cut their cloth, and some of that will be juvenile cloth. That can’t be avoided. What a shame, a necessary shame, but a shame nonetheless.

This is the lie of the GAA land. Pressure is coming on all sides. We have to try and survive as best we can. That’s the limit of most clubs’ ambitions. Realism.

This brings me back to my point about the silly season. It’s a favoured time for GAA directors generals, presidents, provincial secretaries, right down to the humble club secretary, for they can unveil their annual reports, comments and suggestions for making the world a better place.

For many it is their moment in the sun and, God bless them, some deserve it. (Who among you is old enough to remember the annual “we don’t get enough games for our county hurlers in Galway”? – an annual whinge that was usually accompanied by a refusal by their hurlers to join Leinster/Munster!)

This year’s silly season has already started and, in the absence of a strike, it appears the chosen topic will be alleged payments to managers.

Our top man Paraic Duffy has already done his obligatory sabre rattling in reports. He wants it stopped, he’ll appoint a committee to look into it and he’ll say it’s a disgrace. The papers will run with it, and we’ll have a nice debate some evening with Des Cahill on the radio. The lovely phrase “anecdotal evidence” will be wheeled out and “‘six figures” will be mentioned.

By the way, clubs allegedly paying outside managers strikes me as a luxury. County managers are probably over remunerated but good luck to all of them. It must be because they think they are worth it. Trying to stop it is a ridiculous waste of time and effort. As usual, we’re trying to be pound foolish and penny wise.

Meanwhile your club’s best hurler or footballer is heading for Canada. Your teenager can’t train through the winter with the U-16s because the club can no longer afford the cost of the floodlights. Your county panel is decimated, and next summer will be over before it starts.

I am well aware that we all have our own problems. But the GAA is our family. Surely we can put our heads together? Surely Paraic Duffy can assemble a committee to tackle that? A high-powered, capable bunch of people who can steer our clubs and county teams through this recession.

Because there must be ways we can spend less but get more. Perhaps the mere highlighting of the problems will shake the trees and, who knows, maybe a JP McManus or two will fall from the branches?

At the very least, we should be talking about it nationally. This is what the silly season should be for.

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