The GAA has signalled it may ban alcohol-related sponsorship, but can it really change attitudes? Keith Duggan reports
Many of the best - and generally unprintable - GAA stories feature drink. The association has a complex relationship with alcohol. The archetypal countryman wearing a pioneer pin in a bespoke lapel is still prominent in GAA circles but, like the rest of Irish society, the association is saturated in alcohol. Tomorrow, the Jones Road replaces Clones for the Ulster football final but if local traditions are upheld, drinking will be hard and earnest. The same is certain to be true in the hurling strongholds of Kilkenny and Galway after tomorrow evening's championship qualifier. The GAA, particularly in summer, provides great games that are endlessly emotive and for many people those 70 minutes are the start of a day of heavy-duty drinking.
Tonight being a Saturday night, the airwaves in every town in the country are sure to be laden with text messages among minors planning a night on the Buckfast, or cider flagons, or spirits smuggled from the drinks cabinet. Some play Gaelic games, some do not. But complaints from GAA coaches about minor players turning up with blank, red eyes or not at all have grown more vocal in recent years. The recent report by the GAA's alcohol and substance abuse task force is the firmest indication yet that the association wants to shout stop. Aware of its deeply embedded and uniquely influential position, the ambition is to create a new mood and attitude towards drink.
Joe Connolly, the celebrated Galway hurler, has been the most vocal member of the task force. He is not a teetotaller and is anxious to avoid sermonising about the evils of drink. Invited to chair the task force, he accepted, primarily as a parent of teenage children facing the same concerns as any other in the country.
"But I think the other reason I felt compelled to do this was just the thought of so many potentially great hurlers whose brilliance I saw decimated over the years because of drink. Guys who could make a ball sing being transformed into bit players in leagues way below the standard they belonged in. To see natural talent wasted is a very sad thing and there are players like that, hurlers and footballers, in every town in this country. The opportunity to change that is a beginning."
The most glaring link between the association and alcohol is in the Guinness sponsorship of the GAA, which has been ongoing since 1995, the year Central Council voted to reverse its policy never to endorse alcohol.
From the beginning, it was one of the most imaginative and culturally symbiotic advertising campaigns in the history of Irish television, so much so that in some quarters it was credited with sparking the new dawn of hurling that summer. Because of that, it has probably been a victim of its own success, with overt criticism from members of the Catholic hierarchy and the Minister for Health and Children, Micheál Martin.
"I do think its success is the reason it has been singled out," agrees Pat Barry, director of communications at Diageo, which is responsible for the Guinness brand. "In overall terms, we actually welcome the GAA task force report but we have a somewhat different view in terms of the issue of sponsorship. What we feel is that the Guinness sponsorship of the hurling is not about promoting a brand of alcohol but is about showing a relationship and a common interest with the existing consumer. We fully recognise there is a level of alcohol abuse in Irish society that is deeply worrying, particularly among our young - for reasons that I think we all know are complex. But in relation to Guinness, it is actually aimed at a more mature audience."
It is true that Ireland's young do not turn to Guinness to get off their heads: they prefer more colourful concoctions. Yet in recommending that the GAA phases out its relationship with alcohol sponsorship, the intention was merely to provide a symbolic gesture.
"Well, that's exactly what it is," says Connolly. "What good would ending any given sponsorship do in practical terms? The purpose of that is just to reflect the mood of the association. The real work is to be done on the ground." The task force believes it can use the youth cachet that the GAA now commands to change the wanton attitude to alcohol that sweeps the country, unchecked by the best efforts of parental, legal, educational and medical efforts.
Connolly is optimistic of getting some of the association's non-drinking stars such as Seán Ó hAilpín and DJ Carey to "get in front of the camera and tell kids there is another way".
With a potential audience of 150,000 children between the ages of 14 and 18, he is optimistic that the phenomenon of children racing to booze with the group mentality of lemmings can be turned around. Tales of children who are fine at 10.30 p.m. every night but somehow blitzed an hour later are common.
The GAA plans to have trained officers to supervise a specified programme of education and prevention in place in every club in Ireland within two years.
The intention is not to try to isolate the association from alcohol or to preach a message that alcohol is evil but to create a more reasonable and enlightened atmosphere. Many GAA clubs generate revenue from their own bars; more still are sponsored by local pubs.
Many major alcohol brands own logo-festooned corporate boxes in Croke Park. Alcohol will still be a prevalent force in GAA.
"The GAA just mirrors society," says Connolly. "Weddings. Funerals. Birthdays. Matches. They are all framed traditionally around drink. We want to get our younger members to look at the bigger picture and to see there is an alternative to getting kicks from alcohol - or chemicals for that matter.
"I mean, to put it simplistically, nature intended that kids should get out and play sport at whatever level and enjoy themselves growing up as best they can. If we have lost that, where do we go from here?" He fervently believes children will be receptive to a new approach, pointing out that the younger generations often hold a far firmer line on drink-driving, for instance, than many of their elders. It all comes down to how the message is communicated.
At the highest levels of Gaelic games, alcohol plays a bit-part in the lives of athletes. Blowouts are few and far between. When Armagh won the All-Ireland football championship in 2002, it was significant that the team refused to fill the Sam Maguire with alcohol out of respect for the cup. Given the counties in which the venerable old ornament was previously housed, it is a wonder Sam did not experience the DTs.
Meanwhile, Guinness, which has poured £25 million (€32 million) into the GAA over the course of its sponsorship will continue its link with hurling for another two seasons. After that, it seems highly likely the association will revert to its pre-1995 stance.
By that time, it is hoped a new mood will prevail and that GAA coaches will once more turn up for training on a Sunday morning confident of coaching underage players looking for the ball instead of the cure.