The 42FM

On this week’s podcast, and off the back of Sarah Healy, Mark English and Kate O’Connor’s medals at the European Indoor Championships, Sinéad and Gavin choose not to spend too long basking in the Ireland’s latest athletics success. They are joined by former 50km walk world champion and RTÉ pundit Rob Heffernan to look beneath the surface of the medals and ask: are these medals because of the Irish system, or in spite of it?

Rob explains what Irish athletics is doing well at an elite level, and what it must do better.

Having founded an athletics club in Cork, Rob is also well-placed to explain the challenges and opportunities at a grassroots level. He explains why the State needs to do more to improve PE hours in school, why investment in facilities is necessary, and why better talent ID is needed for Ireland to capitalise on its potential at a moment major medals has thrust the sport into the national spotlight.

Get in touch - email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The42 FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

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Gavin last week met our new sports ministers for the first time, who told him that the government’s promised funding for professional football academies is ‘not imminent.’

The comment caused despair in football circles, and the necessity for his money is the centre of this week’s episode. Sinéad and Gavin delve into the minister’s comments and wonder why they are so slow to follow through on their promises, before Gavin give the reality on the ground as to why the funding is already too late.

While there have been headline successes like Mason Melia’s record transfer from St Pat’s to Tottenham, the reality is the academy system is not close to replacing elite player development opportunities that have been lost to Irish kids since Brexit. Gavin has to stats to prove this, and they show that the question you should be asking yourself about our national teams is not ‘How have we become so bad?’, but ‘How are we still so good?’

Sinéad probes the broader questions: Is it really appropriate for taxpayer money to fund the development of a small number of elite athletes? And can the FAI be trusted with this money anyway?

Plus, there’s some listener feedback on last week’s topic of whether the sports media should play a role in helping the national team, and does Irish rugby get softer media coverage than other sports?

Get in touch - email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The42 FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The manner of the exit of Colin Healy from his role as assistant manager with the Irish women's national team has provoked intense criticism of the Football Association of Ireland, and the story refuses to go away. On this week's episode of The 42FM, Gavin and Sinéad explain the background to Healy's exit, why it has proved contentious, and the questions it raises around the competence of the people running Irish football, specifically the FAI's chief football officer, Marc Canham.

They also zoom out on the wider state of the game in Ireland, look at some of the fundamental problems holding the game back in Ireland, and analyse Canham's 'pathways plan' intended to fix many of these issues. Will the FAI's handling of high-profile issues like Healy's exit ultimately damage their plan to overhaul the sport in Ireland, and if so, does Irish football ever have any hope of fulfilling its potential?

Gavin and Sinéad also discuss the media narrative around Ireland's Six Nations game against Wales. Are we actually an arrogant people? And is it really the Irish media's job to stay on-message to the benefit of the Irish team?

Get in touch - email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The amateur filling an 82,000-capacity stadium before returning to the day job on Monday morning is one of the sources of pride among GAA folk.

But how long will players be content to train as professionals and generate tens of millions in gate receipts and commercial revenue and go unpaid - while all around them are earning money? Perhaps not long if you go by what Limerick hurler Tom Morrissey wrote in the Irish Times at the weekend.

Everybody on All-Ireland final days, he says, from management teams to media to food vendors and security staff are professional. But the main actors are doing it for nothing but the honour of representing their county and a modest grant payment.

Morrissey cites a recent GPA-commissioned report which claims intercounty players generate €591 million annually for the economy and support more than 4,000 jobs but are out-of-pocket by an average of €4,500 each year.

The players union says this issue must be addressed urgently - which effectively means that the taxpayer has to make up the shortfall through grants and tax breaks. Is this fair to the exchequer, or should the GAA use their revenue to compensate players? But if that happens are we in a world of open professionalism, as opposed to the more covert kind which has existed for decades?

Gav and Sinead get into the details of the debate and try to work out the best Irish solution for this most Irish of problems.

Gav wonders if the GPA has gone full Flann O’Brien in their request for more money to preserve their amateur status. Just do away with the pretence of amateurism, which is long since dead, he says.

Sinead fears a Pandora’s Box if payments to players are regularised and argues that all-powerful county managers making unsustainable demands on amateur players need to be brought into line.

Also, in the name of economic impact reports - of the which the GPA is the latest purveyor - Gav calculates the considerable value to the Irish economy of this podcast.

Get in touch with the show: email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last week, Donald Trump signed an Executive Order banning transgender women from female sport, beneath the title, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sport”, and on Monday of this week, World Athletics issued updated eligibility rules for the female category.

On this week’s podcast, Gavin and Sinéad explain what these rulings actually mean, and then explore the broader debate: is it fair to ban trans women from female sport?

They tease out the reasoning behind World Athletics’ new rules, and question some of its basis and forecast some potential, unintended consequences.

They also ask: why does a complex, sensitive issue such as this get so much media coverage? They look at the political reasons the topic gets so much media coverage, why Trump was so moved to sign an executive order on the subject, why Graham Linehan and JK Rowling have become so combative on the issue, and ask whether sport is really the right prism through which to look at trans issues.

Get in touch with the show: email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week’s show kicks off with some Six Nations chat: is the Irish team too dominated by Leinster, and is Jack Crowley the fall guy? Sinéad and Gavin dive into the Prendergast/Crowley debate.

The biggest story of football’s January transfer window was Marcus Rashford’s move to Aston Villa from Manchester United. How did this happen? How did United’s local hero, to whom they handed a lucrative contract 18 months ago, become such a diminished figure?

Sinéad and Gavin discuss Rashford’s status and celebrity in England, his use of social media, and how he has been treated by the tabloid press. How has his off-field campaigning affected how he is viewed, and is his cautionary tale that there is no price of fame that doesn’t price in tabloid criticism?

They also discuss how the tabloid press is also used and manipulated by celebrities’ representatives for the sake of fame and money.

Can Rashford rebuild his career away from Manchester United, or is his a cautionary tale about the modern football industry, in which the price to pay for wealth and success is just too high?

Get in touch - [email protected], and [email protected].

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week's episode, Sinéad gives Gavin the lowdown on last week's farcical Dáil scenes, and what is says about this government's hopes of lasting for a full term.

They discuss how politics works when it comes to sport (10:35) - who makes the decisions, and why. Is sport underserved by not having its own, standalone department? And how important is it that a sports minister actually likes sport?

They take a look at the new minister, Patrick O'Donovan (17:35), and then run through some highlights and lowlights from previous sports ministers (19:10) , from attending John Delaney's birthday party to praising Dominant Puspure.

They also parse the Programme for Government (31:30): what is promised for sport over the next five years, and will the government actually deliver on their promises? And why happened to some of the manifesto promises that have since gone missing?

Get in touch - email [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There was a big reaction to last week’s episode off the back of Mack Hansen’s punishment for criticising officials, specifically on the nature of media training, which Gavin and Sinéad described as being akin to a “personality transplant.”

Among those getting in touch to raise their objections to the episode was Marcus O Buachalla, who is Head of Communications at Leinster Rugby.

Marcus accepted our invitation onto the podcast to debate the issue and give his insights from a different perspective.

He tells us how and why Leinster are changing their players’ approach to the media, and what he believes the media should do better to ensure better access.

We debate why content is often bland: why are athletes wary of the media? Are athletes under orders not to reveal too much in interviews? And how much of this is the media’s fault?

Get in touch - [email protected] and [email protected]

This episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The 42 revealed last week that RTÉ have lost the rights to show League of Ireland matches to Virgin Media - despite an early-year press release in which RTÉ appeared to assume they would be showing the games in 2025.

On this week's episode, Sinéad and Gavin dig into this story - why did RTE and the LOI prove to be such a loveless marriage? Were RTÉ neglecting their public service remit by not screening LOI games more often, or were they right not to do so from a commercial perspective?

They explore the eternal paradox of RTÉ's public service and commercial remits, discuss more broadly the role sport plays at RTÉ, and interrogate the role sport should play at RTÉ.

Why is there such little clarity on how much money RTÉ makes from their live sport coverage? Is it appropriate for RTÉ to have so many sports rights, and is it time they launched a sport-specific channel on which to show the many sports they have?

They also discuss why RTÉ's coverage been made so much more bland than it used to be, and whether they have erred in diminishing the role of 'personality pundits?'

Plus, why is everyone so unhappy with The Sunday Game, and are RTÉ right to sell their share of GAAGO?

Get in touch - [email protected] and [email protected]

This week’s episode of The 42FM is brought to you by An Post Money. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When Mack Hansen and the entire Connacht rugby squad were sentenced to media training, it was a deflating moment for sports media. But why should you care about the petty gripes of journalists? (6:17)

Sinead O’Carroll and Gavin Cooney make the case that a more natural, authentic athlete makes for a better interviewee, which in turn enhances everybody’s enjoyment of their favourite sports. (14:32)

Sinead explains the big difference between media training and risk avoidance training. Far too many professional sports teams, she argues, behave in public like scandal-riven corporations trying to bore their way out of trouble. (16:12)

Sinead espouses a more grown-up relationship between the media and sports people, while Gavin lists some of the perils of talking to the press. He details how he once conducted an interview which led to international headlines about an Irish rugby star suffering from a potato addiction. Gav tells more stories from the front line, where PR handlers seek to control access and shape the narrative.(24:50)

Get in touch with us: [email protected] and [email protected] 

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