The Women’s Gaelic Players Association has produced an important benchmark report looking at the challenges with players at the top level of Ladies Football and Camogie have to face.
On today’s Sport for Business Daily, we caught up with Maria Kinsella, Chair of the WGPA and a player herself with Na Fianna in Dublin and with the Carlow Senior Football team.
You can watch back the interview in full above, it runs to 11 minutes, or here are some of the key takeaways.
“Today’s report highlights the challenges facing the players and lays out a roadmap for the development of the WGPA over the coming years.”
What way can we get towards having players not have to dip into their own pockets to pursue her dreams?
“The report details that the average distance for training is an 80 km round trip and the average cost spent on fuel is €55 per week and that only 7 per cent get any travel expenses, unlike the men who get 65 cent a kilometre in normal years and 50 cent this year.”
“We have detailed that the majority of players are funding their own physio, medical expenses and more.”
“It’s not sustainable. It can’t be fixed overnight but we need to be creative and find a way to make it fair, to get equality from government funding for all our players”
Are we in danger of turning the sports into solely the preserve of the middle classes?
“I don’t want to see that. We have to make it accessible to all.”
We have been building up players into role models and attractive to brands but players are not being paid.
“33 per cent are engaged in promotional activity outside of their club and community setting. 65 per cent of them are not being paid anything for that.”
“Perhaps female players have been reluctant to have the money conversation but it is something that needs to change. The players have to recognise their value and brands should too. We are working on education and on developing a rate card for promotional appearances, just like in the Men’s game.”
How about a closer collaboration between the Men’s and Women’s player representation body
“In the last 18 months, members of the WGPA and the GPA have passed motions to further the collaboration between the two.”
“The GPA do not get enough credit for what they do to keep us going. They are our major funder and huge supporter in what we do.”
Read more about the report Levelling the Field
Sport for Business Partners
