John Martin: The coup that nobody noticed

OPEN PATH…As it stands, the Christy Ring winners have been handed an interesting route into the Leinster Championship

I’M surprised there hasn’t been more reaction to Antrim club Glen Rovers’ motion to Congress in relation to the Christy Ring Cup winners. In fact I’m almost as surprised at their being so little reaction to it as I am to it being passed in the first place.

As an Antrim supporter (objectivity is a rare commodity in hurling), I consider it the coup of the Congress, but I’m not so sure that when it pops up above the radar later in the year (because it certainly seems to be well below the radar at the minute) that a number of other counties won’t have something to say about it.

For those readers who (like a lot of people it seems) may have missed it, I’ll explain. Glen Rovers submitted a motion to Congress that proposed that the Christy Ring Cup winners earn a place in the MacCarthy Cup campaign at the Leinster championship quarter-final stage in the same year.

And before you point out the ‘convenience’ of an Antrim club proposing that the winners of the Ring Cup – the overwhelming favourites for which are Antrim – gain a place in the Leinster SHC quarter-finals, the proposal will come into play in 2017, at which stage Antrim will have expected to have returned to Tier 1 as Ring Cup champions. That’s not to say, given the result in Westmeath on Sunday, that Antrim won’t benefit in future years.

That’s a legitimate proposal of course. The status of the Christy Ring Cup has been the subject of debate ever since it was demoted from its role as a curtain-raiser to an All-Ireland semi-final, and various ‘think tanks’ have looked at how to increase interest in the competition. Glen Rovers’ proposal certainly will increase interest in it next year.

But it’s not really the content of the proposal that’s remarkable. It’s that, given the debate generated over the years, and various guises and changes of formats that the competition has undergone, that the proposal appeared to go through without the blink of an eye. In two years we’ll have gone from a format that saw the Ring Cup winners having no pathway to the MacCarthy Cup at all to a format whereby they get a place in the Leinster quarter-final in the same year.

One of the most astonishing things aspects to it is that it bypasses the teams that play in the Leinster round-robin group.

The GPA was one of the ‘think tanks’ that has looked at increasing interest in the Ring, Rackard and Meagher (RRM) Cups. As recently as December 2015, the GPA published the results of a player survey on the RRM competitions. The GPA also proposed a pathway to the MacCarthy Cup for the Ring Cup winner. Their proposal was that the two Ring Cup finalists would enter the Leinster round-robin series in the same year.

Amazingly the Glen Rovers proposal got an 80 per cent vote. I can only imagine that the likes of Carlow, Westmeath, Kerry and Laois were away on a collective toilet break while the voting was going on. Amazingly two more proposals in relation to the format of the MacCarthy Cup were ruled out as they would have conflicted with the opening proposal of Congress. Go figure.

The opening proposal of Congress was ‘that Rule 6.27 (B) and (C) – All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship – Official Guide Part 1 – (pages 93-101), as adopted for years 2014-2016, be retained, subject to: (i) Changes in composition of participating Counties based on the Promotion and Relegation regulations provided for in the current Rule’.

On pages 93-101 of the Official Guide it states that the Central Competitions Committee ‘shall review the list of Counties to be included in the Provincial Qualifying Group every three years after 2016’.

So the opening proposal rubberstamps no change to the current format and to keep to the current plan of a review every three years, but less than 24 hours later, the Glen Rovers proposal is passed. Further to the Ring Cup element, the Glen Rovers proposal also put in place sweeping changes to the qualifier system.

That part of their proposal – which has been passed remember – puts in place two groups of four teams in Round 1 of the All-Ireland qualifier series, Group 1 to consist of four Leinster teams and Group 2 to consist of three Munster plus one Leinster team. It’s bizarre that this has been passed given the resistance to all forms of group games since the format was last played back in 2007.

It also has three Munster teams in the same group along with one Leinster team. That makes me think that Waterford, Clare, Cork, Tipperary and Limerick must have joined Carlow, Westmeath, Kerry and Laois on toilet break during the vote.

Given the resistance to any sort of group format, how is it that the same Munster counties that hold hurling to ransom every year by protecting the special status of the Munster Championship now agree to a group format that sees three Munster teams – at least two of which are likely to be genuine MacCarthy Cup contenders in any given year – will knock lumps out of each other to get to the second phase of the qualifiers, while the ‘Leinster’ group will likely contain the Ring Cup winners and two teams that came through the round-robin series?

Anyway, I think it’s a case of watching this space on this one. I can foresee the debate that didn’t happen at Congress taking place at an Ard Comhairle some time before the end of the year – and a number of counties won’t go to the toilet this time.

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