Mr. Tom Ryan:

This would be very useful. Games are played over a Saturday and Sunday. The central competitions control committee convenes on a Monday and looks at the results from Saturday and Sunday. It will then arrange the fixtures for the following weekend. Despite what some of the commentary might say, it is an independent group. I do not have any voice on it. It is independently constituted. It will set fixtures based on a number of criteria. There is the integrity of the competition and making sure there is the same turnaround for teams at the same stage. It looks at the venues that are available. Perhaps it might look at other events that are on in cities throughout the country. It will come up with a programme of games for the following weekend. These are typically on Saturday and Sunday.

In the normal course of events the traditional slot for games purchased by RTÉ is on Sunday. Depending on what package a particular broadcaster has bought and what rights it has, it will look at the games that are available to it, what games are within the package to which it has rights, and it will try to fit them into the slots it has available. At the top of the hierarchy is the game played on Sunday shown on RTÉ. GAAGO has typically looked at the Saturday fixtures.

By and large, if a game is on a Saturday, it will more than likely be on GAAGO. If it is on a Sunday, it is at RTÉ's discretion. It is not fair, and it has been characterised as such in the past a little, to say that RTÉ or the GAA pick which games to show. We do not pick games based on revenue. Contracts are signed at the start of the year, so we will earn the same revenue irrespective of what games are shown on what day or if a game is not shown at all.