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The GAA will finally confirm the structure for the 2021 intercountry and club calendar early next week.
RTÉ Sport understands that the 2021 season will begin between counties first, and the championship series will run through mid-July.
From there, the club championships will begin and incorporate county, county and all-Ireland series until mid-December when the all-Ireland club football semi-finals will be held.
The template is expected to be unveiled on Monday after weeks of intense debate and scrutiny at the executive and managerial levels.
Having been scheduled for launch three weeks ago, the roster was suspended as concerns were raised about the financial feasibility of staging an inter-county season first with the continued lack of entry receipts, a major concern for some.
With strong public health restrictions also expected through January, the prospect of going first with the club has weakened considerably.
And after a period of reflection and further consultation with county presidents and the management committee last weekend, a Central Council meeting at 8 p.m. tonight gave the green light to kick off the 2021 campaign with action among the counties.
This is understood to see the return of county teams to preseason training on the weekend of January 16-17.
And the Allianz Leagues are expected to kick off the weekend of February 27-28, with the soccer divisions split in two at the regional level.
This will see Dublin, Galway, Roscommon and Kerry grouped together in one Division One group with the four Ulster teams – Monaghan, Tyrone, Donegal and Armagh in the other.
Division Two will see Down, Westmeath, Meath, and Mayo in one section with Cork, Clare, Laois, and Kildare in the other.
The third division will feature Derry, Fermanagh, Longford and Cavan in one section with Limerick, Wicklow, Offaly and Tipperary in the other.
Meanwhile, Division Four sees Carlow, Wexford, Waterford and London, (their participation depends on the Connacht Council) in one group with Leitrim, Antrim, Louth and Sligo in the other.
Unsurprisingly, each county will have a minimum of four league games, and there will be semifinals for a decider spot and relegation.
There will be no club-only April with the inter-county season imminent at that time. The hurling league will see two groups of six in Division One with no quarter-finals or semi-finals. The league final will take place on the second weekend of April, one week after the soccer final.
The minor and under-20 soccer competitions will begin a month later, the weekend of March 20-21.
This would allow the intercountry senior football championship to begin April 17-18 and the hurling championship to begin a week later.
A backdoor is believed to be available to counties in both hurling and soccer.
The finals and the 2021 All-Ireland minor hurling are likely to be played May 22-23.
The final of the Tailteann Cup (second division soccer championship) is also on the roster and will be played at the end of June with the all-Ireland pitching final for the weekend of July 10-11, the same weekend. week that the Sub- The 20th hurling final takes place.
All Ireland senior football will be set for the weekend of July 17-18.
A week later, July 24-25, the county club championships will begin.
The start of the provincial club championships is scheduled for October 16 and 17, until the beginning and mid-December, when the hurling and soccer semifinals will be played, respectively.
Last Friday night, the clear majority of county chiefs favored this template.
It was presented to the GAA Management Committee last Saturday and was again given the green light at tonight’s Central Council meeting.
Initially two comprehensive plans had been compiled: one draft focused on playing inter-county first, while the other roster revolved around a club-first system you’d like.
But with those public health restrictions expected once again during the early stages of the new year, hosting a club championship would have been exceptionally problematic, as only elite athletes could compete under the Level 5 restrictions.
A first club season in 2021 would have seen teams return to full contact training in late February and play through to the Irish club final, which would have been played on 14/15 August.
The inter-county season would have started on July 31 and concluded at the end of December.
However, the strong support for a county-first approach was again reflected in tonight’s meeting and an official GAA announcement announcing the inter-county kickoff is due early next week.
Meanwhile, the GAA standing ground rules committee also made a series of recommendations for tonight’s Central Council meeting.
These will be adapted as motions before the 2021 Annual Congress in February.
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