GAA President Larry McCarthy wants to have 36,000 fans in attendance at the All-Ireland semi-finals and is hopeful that an even greater number could attend the finals in Croke Park if Covid-19 restrictions continue to ease.
This weekend’s Leinster Senior Football Championship semi-finals will have 18,000 fans in attendance and McCarthy is hopeful the number will continue to increase as the easing of restrictions continues across the summer months.
Speaking on Morning Ireland on RTE Radio One, he said: “We don’t know what is coming down the track. Yes I do I’ve a lot of concerns about the various variants and our ability to cope with it. But, look, we are on the right track, we are seeing participation, we are seeing kids going back into camps, club games going on up and down the country and hopefully we can keep on that track right through the autumn because we need county championships to be run and run effectively so that our county boards can generate income and we can begin to fund our teams again for the next season, for 2022.
“We’ve made very good progress in terms of intercounty attendances over the last couple of weeks thanks to the Minster for Sport Jack Chambers,” he continued.
“We’re now looking at 18,000 in Croke Park next weekend and hopefully we’ll ratchet that up to twice that by maybe the All-Ireland semi-finals.
“I’m being hopeful here and maybe even more crowds at an All-Ireland final. It all depends on our ability to stick to public health guidelines and this variant as well obviously. We will continue to be extremely careful.
“The clubs and county board have done a phenomenal job in terms of managing this but hopefully we will see larger crowds. And as I said to the minister in a conversation last week the more the merrier.”
During the radio interview, McCarthy highlighted that data suggests recent rule changes implemented in hurling across the country have benefited the sport despite some grumbles from supporters.
“The data tells us, and we’ve reviewed the data, that fouling is down. So the rule changes are effective,” he said.
"We will sit down at the end of the championship as we always do and review that again and see what the impact of the changes are, have discussions about it and if we need to change it we will do it but we consistently look at the data that comes back from games and we will continue to do that.
“There will be a review there always is a review of the result of the changes we make the stand committee on rules will look at it.”
The recent clash between Mayo and Leitrim was a topic for discussion as McCarthy insisted that gulfs between certain sides are unavoidable but hinted adaptations to the game could emerge later this year but has urged for calm in the months ahead.
“Inevitably when you have an open tier draw like that you’re going to have a one-sided contest, you’ve a tier one team against a tier four team it is inevitably going to happen,” he admits.
“We are going to have quite a robust debate. Because as you know the fixtures review committee report is up for discussion at Special Congress as I would say the fall or the autumn so there will be quite a robust debate on that and it will give us an opportunity to review it and see where we are.
“Well any unwieldy scores like that (Mayo-Leitrim) are challenging but I wouldn't push the panic button quite yet.”
