Special Congress: Is it the end of the Ulster Football Championship as we know it?

Given the GAA's penchant for tinkering with playing rules and competition formats, one could be forgiven for directing your eyes towards heaven amid the thought of another autumn Special Congress.

With the exception of the gathering held in November 2001 which voted to remove Rule 21 from the GAA's rulebook, the regulation which had banned members of the British security forces from taking part in the sport, the Special Congress has not lived long in the memory.

But Saturday's deliberations at Croke Park on proposals to radically restructure the inter-county football championships will have far more long-lasting implications for the GAA than the Rule 21 issue which essentially went away once that decision was taken.

Those on the different sides of the debate going into this weekend are in agreement on the importance of Saturday's gathering which is being held to address an imbalance in the provincial football system glaringly obvious for some time amid mismatches and counties such as Dublin and Kerry having easy routes to the closing stages of the championship.

The big talking point from an Ulster point of view is the possibility of the province's football championship being effectively downgraded to what many would perceive to be a pre-season competition with no link to winning the Sam Maguire Cup.

"This is a seismic change for the GAA. To use an analogy, this would be almost of Brexit proportions," Ulster GAA chief executive Brian McAvoy told BBC Sport Northern Ireland on Sunday.

Oisin McConville, meanwhile while he believes ideally the two change motions could do with some tweaks, feels the failure of either proposal to garner the necessary 60% of votes and effectively leave the status quo in place would be a huge mistake.

"This is such an important time and I have said before that now is the time for radical change," says the 2002 Armagh All-Ireland winner and BBC Sport NI GAA pundit.

What are the proposals?

Proposal A

• Four eight-team provincial championships

• Lowest Ulster team in League moved to Connacht SFC

• Two round robin groups in provincial championships

• Winners into provincial finals and bottom teams into Tailteann Cup

• Second and third-place teams in All-Ireland qualifiers

• Provincial champions into All-Ireland quarter-finals

• 60% backing needed for all motions to pass

Unlike Proposal B, Proposal A maintains a link between the All-Ireland series and the radically altered provincial championships, which for example would see two Leinster counties moving to Munster and another heading to Connacht.

The word on the GAA street in recent weeks is that Proposal A has been finding little favour even though one could argue it's the most logical solution come up with by the GAA's Calendar Review Task Force Committee.

Indeed Task Force member John Horan, whose term as GAA president only ended in February, said on Monday that Proposal A should be withdrawn from this weekend's deliberations in order to pave the way for Proposal B to be given a two-year trial period.

Proposal B

• Only voted on if Proposal A fails

• Provincial series' link with All-Ireland SFC to end

• Provincial SFCs played in Feb/March

• All-Ireland SFC on league basis with four divisions between April and July

• Top five teams in Division 1 into All-Ireland quarter-finals

• Division 2 winners into last eight

• Second and third-placed Div 2 teams and Div 3 & 4 winners play off for last-eight spots

• Tailteann Cup includes all Div 3 and 4 teams bar All-Ireland quarter-finalists

The Gaelic Players Association's strong support for Proposal B seemed to have garnered momentum for it in recent weeks although Oisin McConville spoke at the weekend of his fear that the wind was starting to turn against the notion of such radical change.

"There's a lot of people who seem to have a lot of skin in the game who seem to have changed their minds over the last number of weeks," McConville told BBC Sport NI.

"I'm led to believe there is the opportunity at Congress to tweak both Proposals A and B. I think if we can amalgamate both of those, there's a formula in there to do the right thing."

But while McConville says that while neither Proposal A or B is perfect, leaving the system as it is would be a big mistake.

"Suck it and see what change will do for two or three years and then have a look at it again," insists the former Armagh star.

Ulster GAA chief executive Brian McAvoy (left) watches on as Tyrone skipper Padraig Hampsey lifts the Anglo-Celt Cup in July

Ulster have most to lose

Given that Ulster GAA probably has the most to lose from Saturday's deliberations, it's not a surprise the province's chief executive McAvoy has been among those most trenchantly opposed to Proposal B.

McAvoy's description of it as "probably the worst motion I have ever seen" led his fellow Down native and the county's senior hurling manager Ronan Sheehan to take major umbrage with the Ulster GAA boss, whose comments he described as "very insulting".

Sheehan was part of the GAA Task Force who came up with the proposals which also included current association president Larry McCarthy and his predecessor Horan but in response, McAvoy stood his ground in his weekend BBC Sport NI interview.

"Look what it does to Ulster GAA. It totally devalues our championship. It dilutes the Allianz League and it costs us 800,000 a year. Tell me a motion that has done that much damage before? I can't think of one," insisted McAvoy.

In addition to his upset at the possibility of the Ulster SFC losing its status, McAvoy referred to the injustice of the sixth-placed team in Division 1 under Proposal B exiting the championship, with the potential of Division 4 winners instead reaching the All-Ireland quarter-finals, which is an issue which has also raised the hackles of Monaghan manager Seamus McEnaney.

"You'll stay in Division One but you're being told 'sorry….you haven't done well enough' to get to the knockout stages to dine at the top table whereas the team that finishes 25th, ie the team that wins Division Four, do get there," added the Ulster GAA chief.

'Players don't have to see the bigger picture'

When asked about the apparent strong support for Proposal B from inter-county players with Tyrone goalkeeper Niall Morgan among the prominent GPA voices advocating radical change, McAvoy retorted the players "don't have to see the bigger picture" and also questioned the players body's voting figures.

"Players just want to play matches. There is also fact that only 30% of the GPA membership voted and some of the people I spoke to said that they didn't really understand it.

"The GPA has a position to portray but if only 30% of your members vote irrespective of how they vote, that leaves a vacuum that hasn't been explained."

As the Special Congress date has neared, much of the debate has narrowed to the financial implications of such major change with wildly varying estimates being arrived at.

Task Force member Conor O'Donoghue said that research undertaken by him in a private capacity estimated that Proposal B could generate an additional 10m euro for the GAA because of extra games provided for under the plan - including the spring provincial matches.

The GAA's financial department took a different view in a submission to county board treasurers last Thursday by saying that the acceptance of Proposal B would instead lead to a "negligible drop in gate receipts".

John Horan (right) has called on Proposal B to be trialled for two years but his successor as GAA president Larry McCarthy is among Croke Park officials who have been circumspect ahead of Saturday's Special Congress

For his part, McAvoy says the adoption of proposal B would see Ulster GAA's income reduced by around 700,000 or 800,000 euro.

Inevitably and quite properly, financial considerations always have to be a major consideration in any GAA decision-making process but Croke Park's intervention last week to say that the financial effects of Proposal B would be "negligible" didn't appear to do its prospects major harm.

In the run-up to any GAA Congress, Croke Park can brings its influence to bear on the counties and other association units involved as contentious issues are about to be discussed.

But the absence of any public direction by the top table thus far has been a little odd - albeit plenty of conversations have doubtless been happening behind the scenes.

Speaking on Sunday, Brian McAvoy, somewhat startlingly, said that he believed most of the Ulster counties "hadn't yet decided" on their voting intentions as they presumably waited to see which way the wind was blowing.

Asked if he was a worried man, McAvoy replied: "I'd be disappointed if option B is carried yes. We're a democratic organisation but I would just say to delegates, vote with your heads not your heart.

"We can get there albeit via a slightly different route but we can get there rather than come to the last hurdle, try to get over it and take the whole fence and all down with you."