Though the 2024 football championship has been up and running for nearly a month arguably the serious business only begins next Tuesday when the draws are made for the group stages of the Sam Maguire and Tailteann Cups, respectively.
This weekend’s provincial semi-finals in Ulster and Leinster will tie up the remaining loose ends pertaining to the line-up of counties in the two championships.
The confirmed teams for the Sam Maguire Cup are: Armagh, Derry, Donegal, Dublin, Cavan, Clare, Galway, Kerry, Mayo, Meath, Monaghan, Roscommon, and Tyrone.
Cork, Louth, Kildare, Westmeath, Offaly and Down remain in contention for the three remaining slots.
The games to watch this weekend are: Armagh v Down on Saturday night and the Louth v Kildare and Dublin v Offaly Leinster semi-final double header on Sunday in Croke Park.
The fate of Down, Kildare and Offaly rests in their own hands – they have to win in order to secure Sam Maguire status.
Louth too will guarantee themselves a place in the Sam Maguire series for a second year in a row if they beat Kildare.
Even if they lose they can still qualify provided Dublin beat Offaly and Armagh account for Down in the Ulster semi-final.
Even though Cork cannot influence their own fate they are least at risk of losing out as they only need only one of Dublin, Louth, or Armagh to win.
Likewise, Division 3 champions Westmeath cannot influence their own fate and they need Armagh, Louth, and Dublin all to win to secure their place in the Sam Maguire.
In the group stages of both championships, there will be four groups of four.
In the Sam Maguire, the provincial winners and runners-up with be the first and second seeds respectively.
The third and fourth seeds will be determined by league rankings with the exception of Meath who as Tailteann Cup winners are designed fourth seeds.
Counties who have already met in the provincial series - with the exception of finals - can be drawn in the same group.
The League rankings are as follows:
1 Derry; 2 Dublin; 3 Kerry; 4 Mayo, 5 Tyrone; 6 Galway; 7 Donegal, 8 Armagh; 9 Roscommon; 10 Monaghan; 11 Cavan, 12 Cork, 13 Meath; 14 Louth; 15 Westmeath, 16 Down.
Regardless of how the results pan this weekend defending League champions Derry will be third seeds as will the losers of the Donegal v Tyrone Ulster semi-final because the counties ranked above them will qualify as either provincial winners or runners-up.
Likewise, if Armagh are beaten by Down Kieran McGeeney’s side will be third seeds. If they win the third seeded teams will be Derry, Donegal or Tyrone, Roscommon, and Monaghan while Cavan, and Meath are definite fourth seeds.
The seeding for the Tailteann Cup is based entirely on league rankings as follows:
Number 1 Seeds: Fermanagh, Sligo and two of Down, Kildare, Louth, Cork, and Westmeath
Number 2 Seeds: Antrim, Offaly (unless they beat Dublin), Laois and Leitrim
Number 3 Seeds: Wicklow, Limerick, Wexford, and Longford
Number 4 Seeds: Carlow, Tipperary, London, and Waterford.
New York are guaranteed a place in last 12 knock-out phase with one of the four third places teams being eliminated based on their record.
The first round fixtures it the Tailteann Cup are scheduled for the weekend of May 11/12.
As was the case last year the first round of fixtures in the Sam Maguire series will feature the Munster and Connacht champions and runners-up against the number three and four seeds respectively in their groups which means a total of four matches in two groups over the weekend of May 18-19.
Their counterparts in Ulster and Leinster will begin their bid for Sam on the weekend of May 25-26.
The provincial winners and runners-up will have home advantage in the round one games.
The format which involves playing 24 games to eliminate just four games ( the top three finishers in each group advance) has been heavily criticized.
But it worked last year with only one dead rubber in the last round.
This is where the real race for Sam begins.
Team managers will have noted that three of the teams (Kerry, Dublin, and Derry) who topped their respectively groups last year ended up in the last four of the All-Ireland series.
Let the games begin:
The schedule is as follows:
Saturday May 18/Sunday May 19:
Seed 1 (Munster/Connacht Champions) v Seed 3
Seed 2 (Munster/Connacht Runners Up) v Seed 4)
(First named team at home)
Saturday May 25/Sunday May 26
Seed 1 (Leinster/Ulster Champions) v Seed 3
Seed 2 (Leinster/Ulster runners-up) v Seed 4
(First named team at home)
Round 2
Saturday June 1/Sunday June 2
Seed 3 v Seed 2
Seed 4 v Seed 1
(First named team at home)
Round 3
Saturday June 15/Sunday June 16
Seed 1 v Seed 2
Seed 3 v Seed 4
(Neutral venues)
