The GAA won't be punishing teams who return to inter-county training early

GAA president John Horan has revealed that it's unlikely that they'll punish inter-county teams who resume collective training before the 14th of September. 

Players are not due to return to group sessions with their county panels until that date but it's been suggested in recent days that players may be allowed return to county training earlier if their club has been knocked out of the championship.

“We're not intending to," Horan said when asked about if county teams would be punished if they train ahead of September 14th.  "We'd like people to call them out but we're not actually intending to impose any penalties.”

Director General of the GAA, Tom Ryan, added that their focus is not currently on possibly sanctions for those who go back early:

“Today is about the fixtures programme and the calendar and what that might look like. The next step is looking at what safeguards that we put around that.

"I think myself, the last three or four months, and the reason we're at the stage we're at is because the country as a whole and the Association has shown a great degree of restraint and personal responsibility.

“We'll be asking people to abide by those because they're the right thing to do. If there's a second stage required in terms of sanctions and penalties and so on, yeah of course we'll look at that. But that's not one for today.”