No plans to sell naming rights for Croke Park, says GAA director general Tom Ryan

The sale of naming rights for Croke Park was ruled out at Thursday’s launch of the GAA’s annual reports. The question arose in the context of the Cork controversy concerning SuperValu’s branding deal with Páirc Uí Chaoimh.

Director general Tom Ryan was asked about the prospect of the GAA’s national stadium being associated with a commercial partnership.

“At this remove, that’s a hypothetical question but I’ll answer it in a finite way. We have no plans at all today to do anything on that. We have no ambitions in that direction. We have had no discussions about it. So, there is nothing on the table regarding naming rights for Croke Park at the moment.”

If an offer was received?

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And if an offer was to land on the table?

“Then we’re getting into the hypothetical stuff. I think a lot of thought and a lot of soul-searching would have to go into that before we even contemplated it.

I don’t want to make hostages to fortune but I can’t see it.”

[ Páirc Uí Chaoimh naming rights deal with SuperValu ‘a sensible compromise’ ]

There was also an emphatic intervention by stadium director Peter McKenna, who is also the GAA’s commercial director.

“All the stands are named after people. Outside the museum here is Michael Cusack’s statue for the Cusack Stand so no, I couldn’t contemplate that ... we’re doing well in a regulated environment, so I don’t believe we have to go in that direction.”

The resolution of the Cork controversy, which sees the county’s ground redesignated as SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh, was welcomed. Ryan was asked in a follow-up had he any update on the final cost of the Cork stadium or was he sticking by the figure of €96 million, which he had given in a previous annual report.

“Off the top of my head, I don’t. That’s not to be misleading. It was a little bit north of that [€96 million] actually. Interestingly enough, when you reflect on the cost of overall projects everywhere ... the cost of potentially some other projects that are ahead of us, it doesn’t look like necessarily a bad outcome.

“It’s there; it’s well used; it’s to a high standard. Spectators and players alike are enjoying it. So, it’s been a good outcome for us, notwithstanding the cost. And it’s increasingly looking like it was value for money. But I don’t have the precise number, it was a little bit higher than that I think, to be fair.”