After the previous year's steady rise, the GAA's operating profits fell back in 2005. Despite increasing revenues, the surplus dropped from €14,175,519 to €10,392,210, a fall of over 25 per cent.

Central Council accounts were less heavily dependent on gate receipts, which fell from 71 per cent of the total income to 63 per cent, but this was a reflection on an actual fall in gate money from €24,189,533 to €22,446,643.

This reverses a trend that saw that percentage hold pretty consistently at over 70 per cent for the past few years, allowing that the redevelopment of Croke Park has significantly raised the potential revenue from gate receipts.

On the commercial front there was good news even if the percentage of revenue generated in this area rose by only one point to 24 per cent.

A further contributor to the fall in reliance on gate receipts was the rise in Irish Sports Council grants, which together with miscellaneous income totalled 13 per cent as against six a year ago.

The fall in gate receipts came mainly from a collapse in revenue gathered in the football and hurling qualifiers.

Between the two the revenue fell by 47 per cent, from €1,761,768 to €899,464. The hurling decline had been foreseen because of the changed format that saw two groups of four teams playing out a round-robin with the top two sides qualifying for the new All-Ireland quarter-finals.

The groups were wholly predictable with only the precise order of finishing in doubt towards the end and consequently attendances were poor. The format did, however, lead to the best eight counties contesting the quarter-finals, which meant a second double bill at that stage of the championship.

According to the GAA's finance manager, Kathy Slattery, however, the revenue from the extra double bill together with that from the Dublin-Tyrone football replay were kicked back into the pot for division among the counties, who normally receive a dividend from the qualifiers money.

Another feature is the increasing cost of team expenses and finalists' grants, a rise of nearly 40 per cent on 2004.

One element of relief for Central Council is that there was no need to make a grant to the Croke Park holding company in subvention of the redevelopment and according to Slattery, there will be no provision for such a payment this year.

Stadium director Peter McKenna said that this was as originally intended but five years ahead of schedule. The debt on the Croke Park redevelopment stands at €41 million, which will be repaid by 2010.

Figures for the stadium showed a turnover of just over €30 million, a rise of €10 million. The operating surplus is also up, by €5 million to just under €18 million. These increases were helped by the three U2 concerts held at the venue last June.

Attendances at the venue last year totalled 1.3 million averaging 49,000 per match day, 60 per cent of the stadium capacity.