The endorsement contract announced yesterday between the Gaelic Players' Association and a recruitment company poses crucial questions for the GAA. First, Croke Park must decide how to deal with the decision of some of its highest-profile players to flout its regulations. Second, it must consider the whole area of amateur status and the possible onset of professionalism.
In a way, the episode has been a lesson in commercial realities for the GAA. If you don't move quickly, you may not move at all. The GAA has not been slow to exploit commercial opportunities in other areas, such as the sale of corporate seating in Croke Park. But the association has laboriously tackled the question of amateur status over the last four years. Now the GPA has, within the space of 12 months, established itself as the most strident voice of inter-county players and concluded a number of commercial deals.
It is easy to sympathise with Jarlath Burns, chairman of the GAA's officially-established Players' Committee, in his angry reaction to yesterday's developments. In the past few months he has been working his way through the labyrinthine, official structures to address such issues as mileage rates and the appointment of an official commercial agency to represent the interests of all players. Now an unofficial body has been able to steal a march on his efforts with a big media event and the kudos of being seen to deliver for players - albeit a small elite amongst their number.
Croke Park's desire to retain full control over the commercial exploitation of its members' playing careers may appear authoritarian. But it is based on the need to ensure that the authorised disbursement of such income is properly overseen and equitable. This is a supportable position. Even the best players must function within the context of a team and no one disputes that not all roles within the unit attract the same publicity. The disparity in potential earnings poses problems of equity and possible friction within teams, which the official distribution policy attempts to address.
How the GAA will respond to the challenge to its authority remains to be seen but its options are stark: either discipline the players involved or concede that elite players can write their own rules. It is likely that the GAA will let the hare sit for a while rather than, for example, suspend a player before an All-Ireland final and provoke a public relations confrontation which the authorities would find difficult to win. Once this season is over, however, we can expect measures such as a code of conduct to govern similar situations in the future.
The alternative is the simple abandonment of amateur status and the dangers that entails. Whereas the purists' theory of amateurism was and remains in itself a form of Victorian elitism, the amateur ethos within the GAA is what ties players to their locality and helps to forge the strong sense of identity at all levels of the association.
Whatever its merits, full professionalism would threaten that sense of community by ensuring that the best players gravitate towards the biggest - and richest - counties. The players are entitled to benefit from the high levels of interest generated by their efforts. While providing for this, the GAA authorities must ensure that the understandable desire of players to exploit their celebrity isn't allowed to undermine the whole structure.