Looking to Sky to let in some light

AT a rough guess, Fabrizio Ravanelli's weekly wages exceeds those of the National League's entire playing staff. Alan Shearer's transfer fee probably eclipsed the 22 clubs' turnover for five years. Administrators and players alike on this side of the water must be wondering quite what they are up against.

Each year the gap between the haves and have nots expands alarmingly, and whether we like it or not, our league might as well fall into the category of an English satellite. Each year more and more obstacles are put in the National League's way.

Now comes Sky's saturation coverage of the Premiership, the English leagues and the League Cup. The Friday night match, Sunday's double headers and Monday's ration ensures a diet of over 200 live English matches this season.

Just when `our' league had carved a niche for itself on Friday nights, Sky provide a counter attraction for the fickle Irish footballing public. It's all very well negotiating further compensation, it's all very well claiming that our own established Friday night product can withstand the latest challenge.

However, come a wet and windy night in deepest mid winter, the counter attraction is likely to be too tempting for at least a few. This has to be a cause of concern, and the best option facing our administrators may even be to try and block Sky's Friday night screening altogether under EC law if that is still legitimate.

But that could backfire and prove costly. Besides, the FAI are already down the road of negotiation, with a view to using the financial compensation towards upgrading facilities further. A worthy and desperately needed pursuit.

Equally pressing, and a related issue, is the packaging for television of the game here. The belated improvement in RTE's coverage, thanks to the unstinting commitment of Stephen Alkin and a few others, ensured that the public saw most of the Premier Division's goals last season.

Missing though, was an established time slot - be it late Friday nights, Saturday mornings, Sunday evenings or whenever - and, say, a weekly 30-45 minutes magazine style programme. It's not much to ask for given the coverage the relatively less popular All Ireland rugby league receives on Saturdays.

A Friday evening slot on RTE radio wouldn't go amiss, though word has it that the station is instead intent on having a sports talk show - an extraordinary choice and something that will be perceived as a snub to the domestic game.

The print media often provokes anger within the domestic game for its perceived lack of coverage. However, as cross channel developments have shown, along with the expanded coverage of Gaelic games and, initially at any rate, the AL coverage, television holds the key. If the aforementioned developments were put in place, there is every chance that an improving domestic game could withstand the latest cross channel TV barrage.

Nonetheless, the onus remains on the clubs to provide much improved spectator facilities. The suggestion from Pat Dolan, in charge of development at St Patrick's Athletic, in this column that first and foremost the National League has to be marketed better prompted another club devotee to question if the product is good enough in the first place.

He wasn't questioning the football itself which, by popular consent amongst regular and casual supporters of the domestic game, has improved significantly in the last five years or so - in part thanks to the greater numbers, of talented young players returning to the domestic game from England and illuminating our grounds.

Time was when only two or three teams started the season with a realistic chance of winning the league (in the mid 80s it was only one). Now, as many as seven begin each campaign with genuine title credentials. Pitch surfaces, not before time, are improving. Friday night, floodlit football has attracted more fans through the turnstiles.

Yet, there remains a chronic need to upgrade grounds so as to make the product more marketable in the first place. Let's face it, in many grounds (some in the Premier as well as the Division One) the backdrop isn't the most attractive for television.

In some cases, basic spectator facilities such as toilets and covered seating are lacking. In this day and age, this frankly isn't good enough - all the more with the increasing levels of nighttime football.

Getting further compensation from Sky and ploughing that money back into grounds seems the best option.