Can anyone say there is a willingness within the GAA to disentangle the All-Ireland series from the provincial championships?

MICKEY HARTE’S reiterating of the line on second chances for provincial champions couldn’t have struck a more responsive chord than it did in Dublin even if the county that turned five successive provincial titles into just two All-Ireland semi-finals could be forgiven for no longer caring now that the qualifiers have road-mapped them into the last four.

Tyrone haven’t been far behind the Dubs in this. Having won three of the past four Ulster championships, they too were unable to match the mid-summer silverware with even one All-Ireland final appearance – and as if to underline the point, took home the Sam Maguire in the other year.

In fact Tyrone have been the biggest beneficiaries of the system, winning two of their three All-Irelands after taking the long way around.

The county also combined with Dublin at last April’s annual congress to advocate a system structure that would allow provincial winners an opportunity to lose a match.

There’s a need to be careful about getting stampeded into changes on the basis on one year’s championship. The statistics have been flying over the past two weeks on the general point that provincial finalists have been doing increasingly badly out the system.

This has reached what some view as a tipping point this weekend with the emergence for the first time of All-Ireland semi-finals featuring none of the eight counties which contested last month’s provincial finals.

In other words the qualifier rounds have produced better teams than the conventional championship.

This shouldn’t be news.

This is now the 10th year of the qualifiers and we are three matches from being able to complete the statistical analysis for all of that period but it’s already known the format has favoured teams that lose matches along the way.

Six of the All-Ireland winners during those 10 seasons will not have been provincial champions – the difference this time around is the title will be taken by a new team, which has come through the qualifiers. Previous winners by this route had already won an All-Ireland by conventional means.

Ironically the only final of the past 10 years to feature two provincial champions was one of the worst, Kerry’s 2004 demolition of Mayo.

It may be the first time all of the All-Ireland semi-finalists have been qualifiers but the average number of provincial winners to have reached the last four since 2001 is slightly less than half anyway and that reflects the strength of Munster and Ulster, who have provided 28 of the 40 All-Ireland semi-finalists (and 14 of the 18 finalists), as well as the weakness of Connacht and Leinster, who have provided just four of the finalists during that period.

But are provincial titles redundant just because Kerry and Tyrone were surprisingly beaten and find themselves off the park in August?

In June Kerry made no secret of their specific interest in winning the Munster title. Their team had a lot of mileage on the clock, went the argument, and would benefit from taking a shorter route this year.

The confirmation in typically breezy Kerry terms that they were actually interested in winning the provincial title can only have intensified Cork’s unhappiness at not taking the many opportunities on offer to win either the first match in Killarney or the replay.

Tyrone re-established momentum in Ulster after a National League campaign that saw them relegated, although Mickey Harte in the aftermath of Dublin’s win agreed the role of defeat in strengthening a team was one of the main values of the qualifier route.

The organisational problem is that second chances have to run out at some stage. At present that level is the All-Ireland quarter-finals. Under the Dublin and Tyrone proposals the bar would be raised to the semi-finals and provincial winners would get one chance to lose.

The main reason it was rejected was the majority of delegates couldn’t see how the extra dates might be accommodated at this time of the year.

Such reservations would be exacerbated were measures permanently adopted to allow defeated provincial finalists more than a week’s rest, as has happened in the past when the All-Ireland quarter-finals were held over two weekends in order to guarantee a break for the teams in question.

One of the main reasons for these complications is the provincial system is entirely inequitable from the outset. In the older, pre-qualifier format smaller and less competitive provinces got the same reward for winning – advancement to the All-Ireland semi-finals.

Even in the modern era with those guarantees removed there is a fundamental unfairness at work.

As well as being able to analyse the priceless diagnostic of defeat those counties in the qualifiers have the great advantage of regular matches. Kildare, for instance, have played on six successive weekends and Dublin on four. As long as a team can avoid injuries that’s the best way to be ticking over. No time for destabilising introspection and also the incrementally developing confidence of winning.

To be entirely fair, a competition should make the same demands on all teams. Any deviation from that creates disparities in the way counties are treated.

This has long been a criticism of the championship system based on provinces of different size and competitive depth.

Yet can anyone say there is a willingness within the GAA to disentangle the All-Ireland from the provincial championships?

One of the likely reasons this year’s defeated provincial finalists fared so badly was each had set such store by winning they hadn’t the heart for what followed the disappointment.

For counties like Louth, Limerick, Monaghan and Sligo provincial titles would constitute major achievement. Add those ambitions to the administrative convenience of the system and the importance of local rivalry and it’s easy to see why projects like the open draw and Champions League-style round robins are unlikely to gain significant traction.

What happened to Kerry and Tyrone at the weekend happens all great teams. Someone catches up with them. That would be the case whatever the championship system.

In the middle years of the last decade both counties had no inhibitions about contesting Munster and Ulster. Both won All-Irelands as provincial champions and as runners-up.

There’s no doubt provincial winners are in some cases disadvantaged in the current structure and that’s not fair on them but the championship has never been fair. Unfairness has always been built into its fabric.

The question is who feels confident about ripping it up and starting again?