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16th July 2018
01:46pm BST
"The long-term solution has to be to look at a different model for Dublin," O'Rourke said last year. "Two or three or four different teams. Because my idea of the GAA is based on participation, involvement and opportunity. "And there's thousands of young Dublin footballers, on the Hill today and watching on television, who would love the chance of playing Dublin. "And the response to population surges in the city - and I gave the example of Castleknock - has been to create new clubs and Castleknock have been very, very successful. "We can't have the population of Dublin being 1.5 or 2 million going forward and just one team. It just does not make sense."Former GAA Ard Stiúrthóir, Páraic Duffy, dismissed the possibility of Dublin ever being split and suggested in his annual report last year that those in favour of the idea are suffering from short memories.
“There is no doubt that Dublin enjoys advantages over every other county," Duffy wrote. "It has the largest population and can access greater financial resources through sponsorship. “But resources in terms of finance or population are no guarantee of All-Ireland success, as Dublin discovered between 1983 and 2011 when it won just one All-Ireland senior football title. “That was in 1995, with a one-point victory over Tyrone. In achieving their five All-Ireland titles in the past seven years, the margin of victory was a single point in four finals (one after a replay) and a three-point victory over Kerry in 2015. “This hardly constitutes evidence of a county steamrolling over all opposition, or proof of the need to divide a county because it is vastly superior to the rest and must be broken up into two or three divisions for inter-county competition."The idea has gained significant traction over the last few years, and while there appears to be a genuine reluctance on the GAA's behalf to entertain the notion, we look at how a potential north Dublin v south Dublin would line up. North Dublin
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