The GAA has about 650,000 members in the Republic (and another 150,000 in the North). Now, some of those people are also into soccer -- for the purposes of this conversation, I'll use the word "soccer" to avoid getting it mixed up with gaelic football -- but anecdotally, the majority are probably not, and a fair percentage of them actively despise it, for largely historical reasons.

Basically, the existence of the GAA has meant that a vast amount of the resources and interest that would almost certainly otherwise have been channelled into domestic soccer has gone elsewhere. If the GAA had never existed, Ireland would be a vastly different country to what it is today, in a thousand ways, but it is a fairly safe bet that, all other things being equal, the country would have a much stronger domestic soccer league.

I love Gaelic football, but thinking of all the potentially amazing soccer players over the years that were lost to the sport at a young age and instead ended up playing Gaelic games would make you weep.

I think it's safe to say if Wigan, Colchester City, Luton and AFC Wimbledon comprised the Big Four, they would have a global following at this point...it would be a moveable feast if it weren't so unmoveable.

but anecdotally, the majority are probably not, and a fair percentage of them actively despise it, for largely historical reasons.

I wonder how many of them under the age of 40 dislike soccer. I'd say the percentage is tiny. There is an enormous divide between those who play gaelic games, and a lot of the administrators.

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even heaven forbid fucking rugby

That was one ELV that sneaked under the radar! I'll have to watch out for it in the next Tri-Nations match.

And I am the Life wrote:

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I wonder how many of them under the age of 40 dislike soccer. I'd say the percentage is tiny.

It's not. Some of them just don't like it because that is what was drummed into them at a young age. Others hate it because of the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Chelsea's millions, etc. And still others just think that it's a shit sport -- too uneventful, too much diving, and so on.

I'm very sceptical about that. The number below 30 would be almost zero.

I don't know how many GAA people you hang around with, but in my experience, the majority of them (maybe 60%), of any age, either don't care about football or are opposed to it.

One small recent example of many: I happened to be up in the Na Fianna clubhouse on the Mobhi Road on the night that Euro 2008 had kicked off, drinking with some friends and a few of their team-mates. At some stage of the evening, I mentioned the two games that had taken place. It turned out that I was the only person at the table, out of nine or ten people, who had watched either match. Pretty soon, the conversation drifted back to Offaly and Westmeath, who had played each other in the Leinster football championship that day.

You must hang out with some odd people. In tipperary the number would be very low indeed. Brendan cummins wears a peter schmeichel jersey along with two tipp jerseys and a clare jersey when he plays for Tipp.

I've not argued that there aren't loads of GAA people who are big into soccer. I just don't think they are in the majority.

hold on now, you've changed the goalposts. We've gone from actively despise, through dislike, to just aren't into it.

"Aren't into it" = don't like it as a sport, it holds no interest for them.

In the same way I'm "not into" U2 as a band, I don't like their music.

you are equating "not into", which usually means indifferent, with dislike or even despise.

This is what I said at 13.14:

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some of those people are also into soccer . . . but anecdotally, the majority are probably not

And I then went on to say that some of those people who are not into it, i.e. a subset, actively dislike it.

but what do you mean by "not into it". Not into it like you are? That they support a premiership team and occasionally watch matches? That they don't watch it as much as GAA? that they support Ireland when they are playing?

I doubt that that many people dislike soccer in the u-35 age category, particularly after the jack charlton era, and the wall to wall coverage since, and I doubt that that many are indifferent to it.

And I am the Life wrote:

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but what do you mean by "not into it". Not into it like you are? That they support a premiership team and occasionally watch matches? That they don't watch it as much as GAA? that they support Ireland when they are playing?

No. I mean people who don't follow the sport, for however many different reasons.

It is commonplace across Ireland that a GAA club game would be played early on a Sunday afternoon, then it's into the clubhouse after where the live English Premier League game would be on the TV. GAA clubs are making a few quid from their club bars thanks to the Premiership.

Ireland is the perfect overseas Premier League market. Not only because of the historical links and constant presence of local footballers plying their trade there, but also because we lap up the whole Premier League Industry - The 24 hour news service, the constant transfer speculation, the 'war of words' that persists among the leading figures, the whole Premier League soap opera. Ireland can't get enough of it. Ronaldo's transfer to Madrid saga has taken up massive press space this summer. It's considered news here, and gets coverage because that's what the people are interested in. And it's this aspect of English football that Irish domestic soccer is struggling against. It's not just that the league cannot compete with Man Utd v Liverpool, or even Reading v Man City with it's Irish interest, it's competing with (and losing to) Middlesboro v West Ham which would get more press coverage both before and after the game than any eircom league fixture.

Irish people with an interest in soccer invest so much time in following the Premier League, and not just the couple of hours on a Saturday or Sunday. I'm not sure that's the same in other countries. For example, has the Ronaldo transfer saga been headline sports news across Scandanavia, despite their own domestic leagues being in-season? It certainly has in Ireland.

It is commonplace across Ireland that a GAA club game would be played early on a Sunday afternoon, then it's into the clubhouse after where the live English Premier League game would be on the TV. GAA clubs are making a few quid from their club bars thanks to the Premiership.

That would be the sort of situation that I would b