Interesting breakdown of team expenditure given at this year's Tipp GAA Convention

The increase in costs to prepare teams was the big takeaway from Sunday’s convention, but there was added interest as - for the first time - Tipperary GAA added a detailed breakdown of costs and where the money went on intercounty teams.

It was broken down into Senior Football, Senior Hurling, U20 Football, U20 Hurling, Minor Football, Minor Hurling, along with the Hurling and Football Development costs.

Costs included were player mileage, team managers and selectors, strength and conditioning, backroom team personnel, meals/nutrition, travel and accommodation, gear and equipment, facility hire, and medical costs.

The overall cost of the senior hurling team in 2024 came in at €765,719 in what was a short year for Liam Cahill and his panel.

The biggest costs, aside from player mileage (€172,306) and management expenses (€117,787), came in the meals/nutrition side of things with a huge total of €119,280 while the upshot in costs for backroom personnel outstripped the other teams substantially with €70,082 being given out here.

Also, medical expenses of €116,984 were accrued during the year, and it contributed to an overall increase in this area across the board with an increase of €51,174, the bulk of which came from the senior hurlers.

Already noted was the senior footballers' massive mileage expense (€181,998) from an equally short year in the championship and Tailteann Cup, the group amounting to the most expense in terms of facility hire across the seven categories with €20,484, only behind development squads who avail of facilities within their own divisions.

Successful years for the minor and U20 hurlers meant that these panels built up a significant expenditure.

The minor hurlers' run to Munster and All-Ireland glory saw them amass €197,693 in expenditure with travel and accommodation costs an outlier with a massive €51,321 in costs accrued that was the highest amongst the panels; including the senior teams.

Similarly to the hurlers, the minor footballers wracked up a whopping travel and accommodation expenditure of €44,428 along with meal costs of €25,248 after their run to the Daryl Darcy Cup final, with overall costs the lowest across the seven categories at €118,308.

Meanwhile, the U20 hurlers cost the county board €204,582 en route to Munster glory and an All-Ireland final appearance.

Brendan Cummins’ team had a more even spread across the board with meals/nutrition (€41,197) and gear and equipment (€47,180) the biggest expense.

Niall Fitzgeralds’ U20 footballers had the second smallest bill by the end of the season at €129,261 with his backroom team costs dwarfing the other teams at just €250 for the year, with their biggest expense coming by way of player mileage of €29,490.

Finally, the development squad costs in both hurling and football totalled at €187,831 as the highest cost - unsurprisingly - came from the strength and conditioning programmes at €94,941 which was almost double the next highest from the senior hurlers (€26,250).

Facility hire was another big expense for this group with divisional teams taking part in numerous competitions this year, meaning that training facilities were needed across the four divisions, coming for €32,029 for the year.