GAELIC GAMES 125TH ANNIVERSARY: THE GAA yesterday announced details of its 125th anniversary celebrations, taking place throughout 2009.
At Croke Park Jarlath Burns, chair of the GAA 125 committee, said that it was hoped that the calendar of events would "celebrate, commemorate and challenge" the association's membership.
The stated purpose of the anniversary celebrations is to mark that "the GAA is at the very heart of the community and events will be held right across the country throughout the year. Next year provides an opportunity to reflect on what the GAA is all about - the promotion of Gaelic games, Irish culture and a sense of place and identity in each community."
"We would hope to leave a legacy after the 125," said Burns, "that gets members to dedicate themselves to the beliefs and values that led to the foundation of the GAA in the first place".
Next month the anniversary year begins with two major events. On January 9th the GAA will be the exclusive focus of RTÉ's Late Late Show. According to Burns this will mark the start of the year's events. "The Late Late Show reaches into many thousands of homes in Ireland and that will be the throw-in event for us."
Larry Masterson, the programme's executive producer, who attended the announcement, said: "It (the programme's 2009 schedule) will kick off with a Late Late Showspecial, which we can kick into full-time now that the toy show is over. It will be a big show."
At the end of the month the 2009 National Football League opens with the meeting of Leinster champions Dublin and All-Ireland champions Tyrone under lights at Croke Park, a revisiting of the first - and to date only - scheduled floodlit intercounty match at the venue, which took place in February of last year.
While noting, "it was decided that we would organise nothing that involved extra games. In 1984 the Centenary Cup was held, but this time we have been told that the diary is full," Burns explained how the event came about.
"On the 31st January there will be a key event, the National League fixture between Dublin and Tyrone. With Tyrone as All-Ireland champions and Dublin under new management we knew we'd fill Croke Park. It's a strange thing for an Armagh man to be hoping Tyrone win the All-Ireland, but last summer I could see this fixture taking shape.
"We will be sending two free tickets for this event to every club in Ireland as a gesture in recognition of their contribution to the GAA.
"We would hope that the media will also support the 125 by doing what they always do, report on the matches, as well as participate in the celebrations. The Irish Timeswill produce a commemorative magazine the week before the Dublin-Tyrone game here and we would hope that other newspapers would also get involved during the year on similar projects."
The next major event will be the GAA's presence in Dublin's St Patrick's Day parade. "The GAA pageant will be the lead float in the parade and the plan is that it should end up in Croke Park and be showcased during the interval between the club finals."
As a former chair of Scór, the GAA's cultural and talent competition, Burns is hopeful that the anniversary will create a new momentum for the event, which will stage its senior finals in Killarney in April.
"Scór is 40 years old and is a very important element of the association's activities because so much of our culture is expressed through it. One achievement of the GAA 125 I would like to see is the revival of Scór."
Other events lined up include the publication in November of the 125th anniversary book, the first release of the GAA Oral History Project and in May two Michael Hogan memorial matches in his home club of Grangemockler in Tipperary. The football match between Tipperary and Dublin will commemorate the 1920 challenge match on Bloody Sunday when Hogan was among those killed.
Asked were there any events planned for next year's All-Ireland finals, Burns said that that nothing concrete had been scheduled.
"There are no firm plans yet. It has been suggested that the St Patrick's Day pageants might play some role on the days but All-Ireland finals work to fairly tight schedules."
A number of cultural events have also been organised. The Irish Film Institute will be screening a series of films celebrating the anniversary.
In March the President of Ireland, Mary McAleese will deliver the Ó Fiaich Lecture on the subject of the importance of the GAA in the past 125 years.
In April a one-day history conference will be held in Croke Park. Then in August, the Parnell Summer School in Avondale will look at the history and contemporary relevance of sport in Irish society.
Cork Hurling Crisis Croke Park may intervene
GAA PRESIDENT Nickey Brennan has, for the first time, conceded that it may be necessary for Croke Park to intervene in the dispute between Cork hurlers and the county board, although he was at pains to emphasise that there were no plans to do so at present.
"In this life you can never say 'never'," said the president at yesterday's launch of the association's 125th celebrations, "but at this stage there are no plans whatsoever in the short, medium or long-term as of now for anyone to get involved in the Cork situation.
"As far as we're concerned there is a Cork team, they played a match last week so there is a team that has been put out by the county board.
"I'm not getting into the ins and outs of that team, but Cork played a game last week - yes it was a development squad - and we're reading what you guys (media) are saying about the future, but it has to work its way now and let's see what happens in the New Year, but we have no intention, either myself or Páraic Duffy or through Feargal McGill, in his role as Operations Manager, of getting involved."
Speaking at the same event McGill responded to suggestions that GPA members were considering withdrawing co-operation from anti-doping procedures in the wake of Kerry's Aidan O'Mahony's testing for irregular amounts of asthma medication salbutamol, and had voted to do so in a text ballot.
"My information at this stage is that there is no great appetite for that. It was just something they threw out to see if there were any heavy opinions. From our point of view we'd hate to see it happening. Sport must be clean. It's to the benefit of our own players that the GAA stays clean."
He also confirmed that O'Mahony's hearing was expected to take place before Christmas.
Finally, the president said that whereas the association was not aware of any breaches of the new policy on protecting the close season, it would act immediately were it established that some county teams were in breach of the prohibition on collective training during November and December.
"We are monitoring the situation as best we can. We're not the sort of people to drive around in the dark of night with the headlamps turned off to see who's training."
New Season Tickets
THE GAA has launched a pilot scheme to offer a reduced-price season ticket for supporters in 2009.
The basic price of the ticket is €75 and covers all league matches and the first championship fixture of the summer.
It is county- and code- specific and each county is restricted to 500 tickets, 250 for football and the same number for hurling.
The scheme was launched by the GAA president Nickey Brennan, who said: "We had been thinking about it for some time. This is a pilot scheme, but it's a serious effort at a time of challenge to appreciate that our members are very loyal. This is to reward those loyal supporters.
"I expect it to be successful and expect in years to come that we will launch other schemes."
Ticketing Officer Ronan Murphy said the scheme went on sale yesterday on the GAA's website - www.gaa.ie.
"This season ticket is great value for money. The fact that it's being piloted in 2009 means that we can manage any problems that arise. It's not a new idea, but we needed to tailor the product to our needs.
"It's specifically intended to reward the loyal supporter and we'll guarantee an All-Ireland final ticket for those whose county reaches that stage.
"The base price covers all league matches and the opening championship fixture and provides a discount of €5 on all subsequent championship matches the county plays apart from finals.
To qualify for the All-Ireland tickets the member must have attended 60 per cent of his county's matches in the year in question.
