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McConville wants inter-county games on Mondays and Fridays

BBC
·2 min read

Oisin McConville believes the GAA should look at scheduling inter-county championship games on Monday and Friday nights.

Speaking on The GAA Social podcast, McConville outlined how spreading the games out as opposed to playing them all on Saturdays and Sundays would ease fixture congestion.

He cited the example of the benefits of underage inter-county games being played on evenings during the week.

"The fact that we are getting the opportunity to see these games on a Monday night, a Thursday or Friday night gives those young players their own platform and what is wrong with that?" he said.

"I would actually love to see more inter-county games go down that route of Friday night and Monday night games, especially when it comes to Championship.

"There’s an open door that we’re not using."

'The way forward at inter-county level'

The Wicklow manager continued: "I know the argument the GPA [Gaelic Players' Association] put up against Friday night games, but I think it is something that needs to be considered again.

"When you go back to early 2000s when we used bank holiday Mondays [for games] there were massive days out in Croke Park and I know north and south have different bank holidays, but I think we could make it work.

"I think it is the way forward at inter-county level. I know there will be problems and there are lots of arguments against it, but we’ve made a lot of things happen and I think we could make it happen."

McConville is in favour of the introduction of a select few Friday night games per season for each side.

He believes it would help mitigate against the fixture pile up that Championship and All-Ireland or Tailteann Cup commitments bring on top of the club season for players.

"It might only happen once or twice a year a Friday night game for each team, but I’m sure we could make it happen.

"It just seems as if there were a lot of games this weekend, last weekend and there are a lot coming next weekend and it would alleviate some traffic against these weekends of games."