TG4 seeking to live stream Saturday's Cork v Limerick hurling clash

Cork hurling fans will be brushing up on their cúpla focal this weekend after it was confirmed that TG4 are seeking to show the Rebels’ Division 1 clash with Limerick. It emerged today that RTÉ and Cork GAA had failed to reach an agreement that would have allowed the game to be shown live by the national broadcaster.

The Irish language broadcaster is seeking to live stream the reprise of what has been acknowledged as one of the best games of 2024 after the Cork County Board turned down a request from RTÉ to move the 7.30pm throw in time forward. 

The body didn’t want the game to clash with Ireland’s first outing in this year’s Six Nations, the eagerly anticipated clash with England. 

TG4 has already committed to broadcasting on television the National Football League tie between Dublin and Donegal, which also gets underway at 7.30pm.

“We have put in a request to Croke Park to see if we can show it on the TG4 player,” said Ronán Ó Coistealbha, TG4’s ceannasaí spóirt/head of sport.

 “It would be going out at the same time as Donegal v Dublin on TG4 (TV) and we’d be competing against ourselves in a way, but we don’t mind doing that as that’s what happens frequently on TG4.” 

Agreement

In the agreement between the GAA and TG4, the station is allowed to broadcast one match on television on Saturday's while broadcasting three matches on Sunday, one of which is pre-recorded and broadcast as live. The broadcaster is hoping that the GAA will allow it livestream the Cork v Limerick match, as a capacity attendance is expected in Supervalu Páirc Uí Chaoimh on Saturday evening.

Until TG4’s intervention, a repeat of row that occurred last year, which followed the failure to televise the Cork v Limerick Munster Championship clash, regarded by many as a classic seemed likely.

A Cork County GAA Board spokesperson had released a statement earlier today in which it stated that the board had been informed ‘some weeks ago’ that the Cork v Limerick match, scheduled to throw in at 7.30pm, was not going to be the game to be screened live on RTÉ on Saturday.

“We were not in a position to meet a subsequent request to change the game to an earlier time to facilitate the broadcast, as the alternative time clashed directly with the Ireland v England Rugby game and we sought not to deprive our own supporters of seeing both games,” said the spokesperson. 

In a post on X, RTÉ Sport had said that the broadcaster had ‘sought Cork-Limerick in the Allianz Hurling League as our match selection a number of months ago but the counties could not accommodate’. The broadcaster subsequently chose the Armagh v Tyrone football clash which gets underway at 6pm.

Cork North Central Sinn Féin TD, Thomas Gould, who raised the lack of coverage of Cork matches across all codes in the RTÉ schedule already this week, said the failure of both Cork GAA and RTÉ to reach an agreement which would allow the game to be broadcast on television was ‘very disappointing’.