The Joe McDonagh finalists enter the Liam McCarthy Cup series at the preliminary quarter-final stage
Carlow GAA chairman Jim Bolger believes that the winners of the Joe McDonagh Cup should be given the opportunity to play in the All-Ireland series later in the same season. Bolger said that it’s imperative that the Joe McDonagh Cup winners get the opportunity to play in the All-Ireland series
“We made a submission to Croke Park, we feel as long as the route to the McCarthy Cup is through the provincial system then there has to be a preliminary quarter-final for the McDonagh winners because the McDonagh winners are playing in the provincial championship for us we’re in the Leinster championship next year and I think it’s a good measure, its invaluable from the players/management perspective to see what the standard is and I think its an eye-opener for the supporters as well. It’s a great way of measuring/benchmarking what the stand is like and where we need to go”
“We felt that the winners of the Joe McDonagh must have the opportunity to play in the prelim quarter-final, its very difficult for the runners-up to gather themselves again if you have players injured, suspended, or many getting the call to go to America as well, that’s very attractive when you look at what they may be facing after losing the McDonagh cup, so we feel there should be for the winners an opportunity for the winners to test themselves to measure where they’re at and give them insight of what the standard is and what is required and they know coming back in next season the improvements that’s required, its a good measure and we feel its invaluable to the winners to get that opportunity”
“In addition, there were talks of having the McDonagh Cup in front of an All-Ireland quarter-final or semi-final and that’s something that’s unpalatable for us, you’re really just getting in the way so to speak, and it’s very unfair to supporters as well. We had a great occasion with the McDonagh final, it was a stand-alone fixture and both sets of supporters took over Croke Park that day, all the Carlow supporters were very close to where the captain received the cup and it led to a great occasion. Just from experience when we won the McDonagh Cup previously the senior teams were coming out to do their warm-up during the presentation which we thought was very disrespectful to our teams, you know while on the face of it to be playing in front of an All-Ireland semi-final our experience says otherwise. I’ve been there when the McDonagh cup has been played as a curtain raiser to a Leinster hurling final and a lot of the hurling fraternity was in watching the Munster Final on the tv rather than watching a live match outside so while on the face of it, it would be great our experience say otherwise”
“It’s hard to get a system that suits all and if you were to look at the bigger picture you’d have to start to look at the provincial system Munster GAA are very protective of their provincial system and rightly so and that’s a wider debate, it’s tough to know what the right solution is. The yo-yo effect is no good to any team, it’s very hard to develop and sustain a good standard if you’re going up and down regularly like that. When we look back we didn’t have a McDonagh Cup but we felt there was a cohort of teams that were there that were too good for the Christy Ring and not quite standard for the McCarthy and this was the answer, I think it merits a little more time a tweak or two to the system if we can have a look at that to see what would work. To stay at the level that you’re at in Leinster you need to be playing teams of that standard on a regular basis and maybe that’s where we need to look at the leagues instead of the McDonagh Cup”
Listen back to the full interview at the link below
