Back door could be locked for future All Ireland winners

A motion that would ban any team that has won an All Ireland title via the back door route benefiting from the system again for three years could be put before the GAA congress next year.

Wexford dual club St Anne’s of Rathangan are to put it to their county board and believe that they have a good chance in getting it passed, and therefore put before the national congress.

“It’s a very simple proposal, that any county that wins an All-Ireland through the back-door system doesn’t get to re-enter it and get a second chance again for the next three years,” St Anne’s secretary Thomas Ryan said.

“If it was up to me I’d get rid of the back-door completely. But, having canvassed several opinions, we have put forward this proposal because we believe it has a very good chance of being passed.

“This back-door system was brought in to help so-called ‘weaker’ teams but when was the last time it really helped a weaker county?

“We saw Kilkenny, the top hurling team in the country, getting beaten in the Leinster final and still winning the All-Ireland, whereas Waterford beat Cork twice in 2007 and still didn’t get through.

“Kerry, the most successful county in football, is after winning two of their recent All-Irelands through the back door. But for weaker teams, like Leitrim in football and Westmeath and Carlow in hurling, what is it doing only prolonging the agony?”

Does the back-door system take the sting out of the provincial championship? I think it does, but for the men who train 9-10 months a year for Championship football, is it really fair that they only get to play 70 minutes of football?

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Posted by Newry Times News on Nov 25 2012. Filed under Sport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry