THE INTERNATIONAL Rules Series will continue in Australia this October in a contest that could determine the hybrid sport's immediate future.
Gaelic Athletic Association president Liam O'Neill confirmed on Wednesday that Ireland and Australia would meet again in October, with the GAA and AFL having all but signed off on the terms of the series.
"We're very near, we've had contact from [the AFL] and we're very near to confirming arrangements with them," O'Neill told website Independent.ie.
"There will be a tournament or an event in Australia involving our players and involving their players."
Independent.ie reported that October's series would likely involve two Tests and a stronger Australian team than the undermanned all-Indigenous side that was thrashed in Ireland last October.
That series was the most lopsided in IRS history, with the Irish winning by a combined 101 points across the two Tests.
GAA president elect Aogán Ó Fearghail, who will take over from O'Neill next February, said last month that the IRS might need to be put on ice if this year's series was not successful.
"I think the International Rules Series may well have run its course for now and may have to be parked for a while, not scrapped," Ó Fearghail said.
"A lot will depend on the 2014 series in Australia and their attitude to it."
Last year's all-Indigenous Australian team was weakened by the unavailability of stars such as Adam Goodes, Cyril Rioli, Patrick Ryder, Stephen Hill, Shaun Burgoyne, Michael Johnson and Chad Wingard.
The Australian's humbling defeat followed a similarly dismal performance in the 2011 home series when a squad lacking in star power was beaten 2-0 and by a combined 65 points.
During last October's series in Ireland, the GAA raised concerns about the strength of the past two Australian teams.
The AFL and GAA held talks at the time about the IRS's future.
AFL football operations manager Mark Evans described those discussions as positive and highly productive, but said both parties had agreed that the IRS's future success depended on both countries' best players participating.
"We think that the success of the series and the future of the series is dependent on getting the best players to participate from the spectacle point of view, from an interest point of view and for the contest," Evans said last October.
The IRS has been put on hold twice before.
After poor crowds turned up for the 1990 series in Australia, no Tests were played for eight years.
After the fiery 2006 series in Ireland, the Irish pulled out of the competition indefinitely, but the GAA agreed to resume in 2008 after signing off on a revised set of rules with the AFL.
The IRS' first Tests were played in Ireland in 1984, but former VFL umpire and media commentator Harry Beitzel laid the groundwork for the competition when he led The Galahs tours of 1967-68 to Ireland and Europe.
