RTÉ will register a formal complaint with Croke Park over the scheduling of this weekend's Galway-Tipperary All-Ireland hurling qualifier match. The decision to play the fixture on Sunday has left Saturday blank for GAA broadcasting purposes.

Yesterday it was announced that RTÉ will screen full but deferred coverage of the match at 6.15 p.m.

"As we understand it," according to Bill Lalor, executive producer of RTÉ's live Gaelic games coverage, "we have an agreement to show eight Saturday qualifier games, three or four at 6.15 p.m. and the others at 4.15 p.m. So far we've had about one match at the later time.

"That's prime time, anything on air after six o'clock. We did it last year and it worked very well for us and very well for the GAA, albeit that there were some complaints about the impact on club attendances."

In response, a Croke Park spokesman said that the situation was ambiguous. "Any agreement on this is very loose. It's also worth pointing out that by this stage RTÉ were supposed to have covered 21 games. To date the figure is 24-and-a-half, so they're not doing too badly."

This difference of opinion arises just after the controversy about the broadcasting of the qualifier draws on the Sunday Game. RTÉ have been unhappy at the leaking of the pairings and pressed to have the draw conducted live, but the GAA resisted because were the draw to be made much later it would then miss out on print media deadlines.

Dissatisfaction with the Saturday broadcasts was brought to a head by the decision by the Games Administration Committee (GAC) effectively to ignore the obligation to provide a Saturday match. GAC chairman Tony O'Keeffe said earlier in the week that the question of television had been a consideration but not a decisive one in the face of various difficulties posed by Saturday evening throw-ins.

Lalor confirmed that RTÉ had not been consulted on the matter. "We were told on Monday that the fixtures would be as they are," he said.

The Galway-Tipperary match was fixed for Sunday and will directly clash with the Munster and Ulster football finals, both of which will be televised live.

One principal reason behind the move appears to be the availability of Tipperary hurler Eamonn Corcoran, whose three-month suspension expires tomorrow night.

Yesterday there were moves to reschedule the match for Sunday evening at 6.15 p.m. rather than at 3.30 in order to allow it to be televised directly after the Kerry-Limerick Munster football final. Croke Park appeared to favour such a move and it was supported by the Galway County Board and the Pearse Stadium committee.

But Tipperary objected on the grounds that their arrangements and accommodation had been finalised and that it was too late to alter those plans.

"We will be writing to the GAA," said Lalor, "to express our unhappiness and disappointment with the weekend set-up. At this stage we'll be lucky to get two games on at 6.15.

"Hurling followers are also losing out. There aren't as many hurling games, for a start, and already we've lost one broadcast because of the fire safety officer's decision in Thurles (which wouldn't certify the outside broadcast vantage point in Semple Stadium and so blacked out the Waterford-Limerick championship match) - which was nothing to do with us."

The desire for post-six o'clock starts is based on the availability of the primetime audience. It also has financial ramifications for RTÉ.

"Advertisers pay most attention to ratings," said Lalor, "and I can say that the ratings for 6.15 p.m. starts are phenomenal."

Meanwhile, the Waterford county chairman has expressed concern over the lack of consultation by Croke Park before fixing the venues for qualifier matches. The county face Wexford tomorrow week in the third qualifier round in Nowlan Park, Kilkenny.

Whereas neither county is critical of the venue, Waterford chair Paddy Joe Ryan said that the opinions of local units should be taken into account.

"Nowlan Park is a local venue for everybody and even if we were a little worried by the capacity I'd feel that if we got roughly half the tickets (the venue has room for 31,000) we'd be okay. But we were a bit concerned that there wasn't proper consultation.

"Nobody sought the opinion of the counties, and I don't even know if the provincial secretaries - who'd know the sort of support counties have - were approached."