Minister for Health Simon Harris insists mass gatherings are 'highly unlikely' to take place at Irish sporting events until next year.
Sport in Ireland is currently on hold due to the Covid-19 pandemic, with the GAA this week stating that the All-Ireland Championships are unlikely to start before July.
The FAI have banned football until the government review the current distancing measures on May 5, while the SSE Airtricity League has set a target return date of June 19.
Minister Harris has not ruled out sport returning at a community level but insists that gatherings will not take place unless safe social distancing can be observed. The Minister used the case of GAA as an example.
"It's highly unlikely we're going to be seeing very large kinds of mass gatherings this year," he told the Sunday Independent.
"Could you get to a point where you can’t have massive GAA matches, but you could have local kids having a kickabout safely? That’s the sort of space that we’re in, that we need to work our way through.
"What's not going to come back quickly are scenarios in which we can’t safely socially distance.
"I can't see how people can be in packed pubs again as long as this virus is still with us and we don't have a vaccine or an effective treatment."
The GAA could overhaul its Championship structures should games be allowed to restart later this year after passing a motion at a Special Congress meeting last Friday.
A return to club matches is likely to precede any plans to restart inter-county action and GAA club activity is suspended until the May 5 review.
