Clare. Tipperary. Clare.
If you set that as the path to the All-Ireland football semi-finals, most teams in Ireland would fancy their chances, never mind the most successful county in the history of the sport.
For Kerry to make it to the last four of Ireland’s most prestigious competition, all they had to do was beat Clare, beat Tipperary, and now beat Clare again.
All-Ireland SFC quarter-final
Tipperary v Galway
Clare v KerrySunday 31 July
— GAA JOE (@GAA__JOE) July 23, 2016
The imbalance is an affront.
Not only is the division of the qualifier system causing serious unfairness, but the way the provincial format currently is has really given some counties a leg up, and some other counties a boot in the stones.
Something as simple as splitting the backdoor teams into A and B pots has wreaked havoc. It meant Kerry and Galway waited on the winners from Tipperary/Derry and Clare/Roscommon. Meanwhile, Dublin and Tyrone are looking at being paired with Donegal and Mayo in the quarter-finals.
So, if Kerry were to reach the last four of the country’s premier tournament, all they will have had to do was beat Clare and Tipperary and then Clare again. And that’s it.
Tyrone, on the other hand, will have had to face Derry, Cavan, Cavan, Donegal, and probably Mayo.
A lot of the times, Cork were free-wheeling into the last eight as well. They usually just had to win a Munster semi-final, lose to Kerry in the decider and then sat one match off the quarter-finals – having won one game in a seeded, unbalanced provincial series.
Tipperary made history on Saturday and nothing should be taken away from them. They’ve beaten opposition from divisions higher and the way Conor Sweeney performed against Derry will go down as one of the displays of the summer as he relentlessly hauled the Premier County back into the reckoning.
But you look at the beaten Munster finalists and you see how they’ve had three weeks to prepare for the game after losing to Kerry. But Derry had to go through epic comebacks against Meath and Cavan in those two free weekends of Tipp and then turn around seven days later and fight for a place in the quarter-finals.
Most beaten provincial sides face the dreaded six-day turnaround, like Roscommon and Monaghan had to recently.
Not only is there an imbalance in the standard that counties are facing to progress into the All-Ireland series, but teams from Connacht and Munster are generally being helped into later in the year because there are simply less sides to face.
The competitiveness is a whole other issue entirely but as long as the provincial championships remain traditional and directly affect the All-Ireland series, as long as teams are seeded, as long as qualifiers are divided into A and B pots then there will never be any real fairness in the way counties go through the football championship.
And, if Kerry make it to the last four having beaten Clare and Tipperary, how on earth can the GAA let that continue?
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