SPECIAL CONGRESS: THE RESTRUCTURING of the hurling championship and streamlining of the disciplinary process remain two major issues facing Christy Cooney's presidency as his first year in office draws to a conclusion.

Cooney was non-committal on both issues when questioned by the media yesterday. The Cork man confirmed a “broad consultation process” will be initiated in advance of the Special Congress in October to ensure the central council motion to fix the anomaly within the hurling championship is addressed.

As it stands, relegation from the Liam MacCarthy Cup has been shelved as the Disputes Resolution Authority pointed out the procedural flaws of relegating Antrim who, along with Galway, were guaranteed three years competing in Leinster and therefore tier one of the championship.

“I don’t want a sticky plaster job anymore,” said Cooney yesterday. “Not that anybody tried to do that. There was a little bit of confusion as to what Antrim’s and Galway’s rights were with regard to their three-year inclusion in Leinster and how promotion or relegation affected them.

“Maybe everybody didn’t see the big picture, but we are all at fault in that. All we are trying to do is overcome the current problem and that will give us time to deal with it for 2010 so we’ll be in a stronger position then.”

Special Congress in October is not scheduled to solve hurling’s conundrum of promotion and relegation. This issue will have to be debated and decided upon at the annual Congress in April – mere weeks before the championship begins in May.

When asked what his own opinion or suggestion was, the GAA president replied: “I’m not going to give an opinion on it. You know my views on special congresses.

“I don’t believe they are necessary unless absolutely necessary and this is one just to move us over the hurdle. We really need to get it right and I don’t want just a short-term solution either.

“If we put something to congress next year that wasn’t thought out we’d be back to where we are with counties going to the DRA and we don’t need that.”

Regarding discipline, Cooney’s predecessor Nickey Brennan came out against match bans despite the clear unbalance in the system whereby players suspended after their teams are knocked out of the championship face no real sanction.

In contrast, a suspended player on a qualifier team, like Monaghan’s Tommy Freeman, can miss the majority of a campaign.

Again, when asked about the possibility of introducing game bans, Cooney refused to offer a course of action, to the media anyway.

“I am not saying it is on or off the agenda. We will look at it if people suggest we look at. I am quite open to people putting on the table whatever views they have on it.

“The bottom line is that we have to make sure we can deliver on it and be consistent. It has to be fair and balanced to players and to the disciplinary process.”

Most surprisingly, on the issue of football championship structures and a possible second chance for provincial champions beaten in the All-Ireland quarter-final (an issue being discussed by the Dublin GAA), Cooney left open the idea of a return to straight knockout despite the obvious loss of gate receipts and television revenue.

“I think it has been shown in a lot of respects, you have Tyrone and Cork that came through the system very well. Mayo didn’t. Should they have, on the day did they perform well enough? It is down to a question that they didn’t perform well enough.

“There are other views too going around at the moment that we should have a re-look at it.

“Maybe we should go back to a straight knockout situation, some people have that view. But I think the current system by and large has worked well for us. It has strengthened a lot of the so-called weaker counties over the years.

“If we can come up with a better system, great. But it is at this stage a qualifier or a knockout system.

“It certainly hasn’t done any harm to Cork. It didn’t do any harm to Tyrone to qualify for the semi-final. So maybe it is just that Dublin didn’t perform on the day. And everyone would like Dublin to perform, there is no doubt about that. Dublin is a very integral part of our association both in terms of it being the capital of the country and its size.

“They just didn’t perform against Kerry and I don’t think that is down to a qualifier system. If that was the case Cork wouldn’t perform either. There is no easy answer to that.”