[ad_1]
Tomás Ó Sé believes that the GAA will have limited room for maneuver if Covid-19 leads to matches being postponed during the upcoming Irish championships, but believes that counties will only withdraw from competitions as a last resort.
On Friday, the GAA announced schedule details for most of Ireland’s upcoming soccer and hurling championships, which will take place between October and the end of December.
Speaking to RTÉ Radio 1’s Saturday Sport, Sunday Game analyst and former Kerry All-Ireland winner Ó Sé highlighted some potential concerns, which will depend on the public health situation amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
“As club players and inter-county players, we are in the community,” he said.
“This Covid is flourishing and thriving in the community and when you look at a team, it is full of teachers, guards, and accountants.
“And the students will go back to college, I know they won’t go back to college 100% and there will be a lot of things that will be done online, but the vast majority of inter-county players will participate at some level in their community work and that’s the concern of administrators, county boards, and GAA.
“They are not really concerned about training. Training will be safe. It’s what comes to training and they can maintain that level of security. It is up to each individual county, which in turn will depend on each individual player to make sure they are safe.”
Ó Sé also referred to the possibilities of postponement of the matches and the impact it could have on the match schedule in a condensed period of the year.
“The Ulster Ladies Club Championship was canceled this morning, Nemo Rangers’ game with Ballincollig here in Cork last week was canceled and they are postponed,” he said.
“The problem for the GAA is that they don’t have room to move in terms of matches. If there is a postponement after the provincial championships, they can postpone it for a week or two if necessary.
“But in Ulster, Leinster, in particular, and Connacht, there is no room for maneuver. So if there is a problem, a team would have to be devastated with Covid for them to get kicked out and I think that’s what [Director of club, player and games administration] Feargal McGill and the GAA were trying to communicate yesterday with their rapid test approach.
“It would have to be a very, very serious case for them to take any county out of the Championship.”
Ó Sé added that, in his opinion, GAA “handled it very well” by making its decision on a tight window.
Listen to the RTÉ GAA Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
[ad_2]