The GAA is to row in behind the Government lockdown with no inter-county activity planned before March 5.
At a meeting of the GAA’s Management Committee, which dealt mainly with issues around next month’s Annual Congress, it was agreed that no training or games would take place while the current Level 5 restrictions remain in place.
As inter-county Gaelic games are deemed to be elite sports, players at the top level are permitted by the Government to resume collective training presently but the GAA has opted against giving the resumption the green light just yet with the country still reeling from a devastating surge in Covid-19 cases since the Christmas period.
It means that the Allianz Leagues will not start as initially planned at the end of next month and, with players requiring a number of weeks’ training before playing games, competitive inter-county action is highly unlikely to resume before the end of March.
The Leagues will likely have to be restructured to some degree now as a result, while the All-Ireland finals are set to shift from July into August.
