RTÉ double down on FAI Cup as broadcaster strikes new two-year deal
RTÉ have secured broadcasting rights for the FAI Cup for the next two years that will see them double the number of matches shown.
The State broadcaster lost the rights to show the
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The FAI and RTE confirmed a new two-year broadcast agreement that will show six games in Men's FAI Cup
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Ryan Brennan of Drogheda United celebrates with the cup after 2024 FAI Cup final
But
Traditionally, the two semi-finals and final were shown, along with around 15 League of Ireland games.
But with Virgin taking over the league and showing 36 matches, RTÉ will increase their coverage with one third-round tie and then two quarter-finals in addition to both semi-finals and the decider.
Next year, RTÉ will show a further game in the second round — the round when League of Ireland sides traditionally enter the competition.
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RTÉ group head of sport Declan McBennett added: 'The Sports Direct Men's FAI Cup has always proven to be the biggest draw of the domestic soccer season.
'The magic of the Cup prevails. We are delighted our extended coverage and high-quality production standards will capture those moments for clubs and supporters alike.'
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Down in Tralee, there was a match between Castleisland and Tralee. Rev John P Davan wrote a reminiscence of that match about 50 years later. He'd no idea who won the match and all he could remember was a fella from Castleisland called Foxy Tom, who threw three fellows out over the rope on the sideline as this expression of manhood. It reached the point where it could only be a contest which inspired something like that if it had meaning - and the meaning was that you represented where you were from. It was a stroke of genius - a lucky stroke in many respects - to make the organisation parish-based. You played for where you were from on a parish basis. Contests then began to take off, particularly after the establishment of the All Ireland and local county championships from the beginning of 1887. We often talk about the GAA in a local context and this idea of local people competing against each other. It's the engine which drives it, and you cannot beat a bit of local bitterness to draw a crowd and give something more meaning. From The Irish Examiner in 2023, how to make an All Ireland winning team? But it also mattered because it had a national framework and you could be the All Ireland champions if you were properly put together and you progressed. If you won your county championship, you earned the right at this point to represent your county in an All Ireland championship and become the All Ireland champions no matter what county you were in. Sport always reflects the society in which it is played and the times in which it is played. Because it is so popular and so intrinsic to so many people in so many different areas, Gaelic football is a mirror to Irish society and to the nature of society at any given time. Just as the informal games of the years before the founding of the GAA reflected that world and just as the pre-television era reflected that world, our game now reflects the modern world. It's hugely organised, driven by data, obsessed with trying to find an edge in fitness and trying always to be on the cusp of the next great thing in that search to be better. But right at the core, it's still the love of play, the love of the ball, the love of kicking the ball, the love of the challenge of taking on another person and the desire to win.
