GAELIC GAMES/Director General's report: The GAA will consider negotiating television rights with Sky given the accelerating accessibility the satellite station has established in Ireland. This emerged from the annual report of GAA director general Liam Mulvihill, which will be delivered at next month's Congress in Belfast.

Mulvihill's comments were made in relation to RTÉ's decision last year to broadcast on the Sky Digital platform. Acknowledging, "It wouldn't make sense for the GAA to sell its rights to a broadcaster that wouldn't have national penetration," he continued: "However the extraordinary deal under which RTÉ agreed to give its televised output to the Sky Digital platform means Sky has been given a huge fillip in the Irish market and it will soon have a penetration (with the willing co-operation of RTÉ) which will make Sky a credible rival to RTÉ in a few years."

Mulvihill was asked did this mean he saw Sky as a credible rival for GAA rights. "It's looking like that."

Domestic rights are with RTÉ until the end of the 2004 championship but Mulvihill said the GAA would not rule out talking to Sky. "Seventy five per cent is accepted as the figure where a channel is regarded as a serious player. If Sky continues the way it's going that scenario will apply in the next year or so."

Mulvihill's annual reports have traditionally pined for an element of competition in the Irish market but he also acknowledged the necessity for widespread accessibility - reducing the likelihood Gaelic games would end up on subscription channels (as opposed to the more generally available Sky One).

"There's never been any secret about association policy on this. We would prefer a terrestrial station to have the rights to our affairs because it wouldn't make sense to have a large number of Irish people not able to see our games. That's why when the Government list (of sports events protected for television) was drawn up the only listed GAA events were All-Ireland finals and semi-finals. It was recognition that we weren't likely to sell off our games for pay-per-view."

Other issues mentioned in the report included the shortfall in Government funding after the withdrawal of €38 million in promised funding.

"Obviously we wouldn't have pushed ahead of the finalisation of Phase Three (Hogan Stand) so quickly or on such a scale if we had known what was going to happen, but we are now short of what we anticipated having towards Croke Park while we had also counted on getting a further €6.3 million per annum for the other projects (promised for games development and physical facilities outside Croke Park)."

The reports goes on to hope "that the previous commitments will be honoured in time" and to confirm the GAA's interest in "any plans for a national stadium or for a new project to replace the National Stadium with a smaller development."

Rising costs in the preparation of county teams has been in the news with figures released by Croke Park last month indicating the financial difficulties counties are experiencing. Mulvihill yesterday said he wouldn't be surprised if counties were to "pull out of subsidiary competitions. Some hard question will have to be considered in the years ahead."

Mulvihill also refers to the recently contentious issue of drinks sponsorship.

"The Guinness sponsorship of the All-Ireland senior hurling championship will be in place for another two championship campaigns. The sponsorship came in for some criticism from inside and outside the association in recent months. In reading all the references to the matter one would be forgiven for thinking that the GAA was the only Irish sporting organisation to have a sponsorship relationship with an alcoholic drinks company."

Player issues are also dealt with but the emphasis on the importance of players' treatment comes with a warning. "We should remember that players, whatever group they use to raise issues, are first and foremost members of the GAA and the issues can only be resolved within the GAA and not in the national media."

Mulvihill also told the media conference in Croke Park that the GAA had had no contact with the Sports Council over standardising suspensions for drug offences. GAA president Seán McCague intervened to emphasise the point. "Penalties will be a matter for our association. No suspension will be imposed on our members by an outside organisation."

Traditionally Mulvihill's annual reports have contained some radical suggestions for reforming the association. This year's kite concerns the provinces.

"Are the provincial boundaries sacrosanct or could we redraw the boundaries to give us a more even provincial championship in every province and to give a more equal distribution of finance? If this is not done we have a further inequity in a basic element of our overall structure and some of the counties in the less successful provinces could have difficulty in surviving."