McGuinness: ‘At the minute we’re in purgatory as we don't know where we are’

Jim McGuinness admits he and other inter-county managers are facing a waiting game ahead of the possible adaptation of the proposed new rule changes.

The GAA's Central Council approved the Football Review Committee's new rules to be voted upon and whatever gets through Special Congress this coming Saturday will be in for a trial period across club and county in 2025.

The proposals were tried at the inter-provincials last month and the Jim Gavin-led FRC made two small changes to the proposed rules afterwards, with four points for a goal and two points for a 45 both dropped.

“They will mean a major change if they do come in,” McGuinness told Noel Cunningham at the Donegal Association London annual event at Hilton London Wembley of the proposals.

“This time next week we'll know a lot more or will be in the process of knowing a lot more. At the minute we’re in purgatory as we don't know where we are. There's not a coach in the country that's not waiting hard to understand what we are actually going to be working with in terms of the rules next year.

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“What gets in and what doesn’t get in will have a massive impact on how the games will be played, it will have a massive impact on fitness levels. If all the rules come in for talking’s sake, I think it’ll dramatically change the physical nature of the game and make it much more transitional, which has been missing for the last number of years.

“Everybody's waiting now. Some people are waiting on Santa but we're waiting on the rules to see what's going to happen. Then obviously as a coach, all we can do is coach to the rules so we're trying to understand them as quickly as possible and then get our head around to see how we can take advantage of them. 

“We would always have the opinion regardless of what the rules are, then you must coach to the rules. That's the bottom line. If the three-up does come in, there's the potential for the throwback from maybe 20 years ago.

“You're gonna have players to play off further up the pitch that's going connect the play from a defence to attack. I think you could see maybe you're a renascence of number 11s as well. Players like we had, Michael Hegarty, playing that role, getting the ball and playing those threaded passes to the inside line. All these bits and pieces are in the air. We’ll wait and see how it falls.”

With Donegal the current Ulster champions and having reached the All-Ireland semi-final last season, only to be edged out by Galway, there is a level of expectancy building ahead of the new campaign.

“Every season will carry its own sort of pressures but every game really carries a pressure,” McGuinness said. “When things are going well, things are going well but one defeat is all it takes for things to unravel. We actually don't look at it that way at all. We look at every game on its own merits. I suppose the secret is to try and prepare as best you can and we're trying to get the players to do that obviously from a physical point of view and technical point of view.

“Then from a coaching point of view, we obviously try and leave no stone unturned and I think if you do that then you can actually you can sleep in your bed at night because you know that you couldn't have done any more. I've said many many times - if we do everything right and we get everything right, all that does is allow us to be in the fight because there’s Dublin, Kerry, Armagh, who have just won the All-Ireland, Tyrone won one in the last couple of years and Galway have been in two of the last three finals. There’s massive competition. For us, we just want to try and be amongst that and be competitive and we were competitive last year. Please God we can push on now.”