A well travelled sage of the inter county football scene once dubbed a certain team ‘Kings of the challenge match”! The meaning was clear, and franked by the fact they once beat a team by 2-16 to 0-00 at a pitch opening. A few months later, those who had been whitewashed sat atop the pile.
The moral of the story? Challenge matches, in most cases, aren’t worth the grass they were played on. They’re nearly a thing of the past now. Meaning that, if there is such a thing as meaningless competition in the GAA, it’s in the guise of the pre season competitions.
There’s a sizable cohort of the populas would call on the Brains Trust to do away with the Cup competitions which re-start the GAA year each January. Indēed they must have thought they had achieved their goal when they were shelved in 2021 due to dastardly restrictions foisted on society owing to Covid-19.
Thankfully, however, such protestations fell on deaf ears and the pre season games are back in full swing. Offering, depending on which way look at it, early season joy or false hope. Think of some of the less prominent counties defeating, say, Dublin or Kerry in football or somebody taking the scalp of, for example, Limerick or Cork who sit atop the pile presently.
At some point between the end of one GAA season and the commencement of the next each year, yours truly professes a longing for the beginning of the O’Byrne Cup. This year was no different, except there was and is an unquenchable desire and determination to put 2021 as far into the rearview mirror as is possible.
Thus, anticipation of a trip Bray Emmets to see Meath take on Wicklow in the O’Byrne Cup turned to disappointment when the game was called off as the hosts were unable to field a team to Covid-19 numbers.
Unfortunately due to a family bereavement, the trip to Stradbally will be a non runner, but these wheels will be parked on a sideline sooner rather than later.
Anyway, even during this, the opening week’s action of the 2022 season, there were instances of early season upturns, new regimes setting out their stalls and another piece of GAA history being made for entirely different reasons.
Top billing, though, must go to the Kerry hurlers who spoiled Colm Bonnar’s maiden outing as Premier supremo by recording a noteworthy and merited victory. Right, so the Kingdom are unlikely to be pulling up any trees any time soon. Nor is there likely to be any major panic or fears of a major regression in Tipperary.
Yet it deserves to be and must be acknowledged as a noteworthy victory for the stickmen who hail from where the sun declines beneath the blue sea. It serves as a vindication of the progress which has been ongoing within the small but admirable Kerry hurling community.
In Shane Conway (pictured above) the have in their ranks one of the finest exponents of the old game currently gracing it. They may not be about to seismically alter the face of the game but get used to seeing more of them.
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The hurling fraternity tend to be a tight knit bunch. Eamonn Sweeney’s often referenced ‘Hurling Man’ piece was, I suspect, partially in jest but it was also bang on the money. Hurling devotees will go everywhere and anywhere to promote, develop and assist the small ball game.
How else to explain people like Dinny Cahill, Brendan Cummins, Darren Gleeson and Liam Sheedy making the trek from the Golden Vale to the Glens of Antrim to work with the hurlers thence.
Likewise when former stars of the playing fields Michael Duignan, Martin Comerford and Michael Kavanagh linked up with Meath backroom teams at different times. That’s not to say that all such interventions go according to plan.
You wouldn’t have to look too far for evidence to back up the latter theory. Indeed, one could only muster a wry smile when observing developments elsewhere in more recent times compared to what happened when certain external help was in place close to home. In one instance anyway.
The other phenomenon which is definitely more prevalent in hurling than football is that of former top players going into management with counties other than their own. Yes, mention was afforded earlier to the Tipperary lads going up to Antrim and the like in coaching and/or advisory roles, but, there have been numerous cases of ex players managing counties outside of their own for the betterment of those they were working with.
See Justin McCarthy’s tenure with Waterford or Davy Fitzgerald also with Na Deise and Wexford or Anthony Daly’s ground breaking stint with Dublin as evidence of same. Fast forward to now and the opening day of the 2022 season which pitted former club and county teammates and legends Michael Fennelly and Henry Shefflin in opposing corners as managers of Offaly and Galway respectively.
I will gladly admit to being more than slightly surprised to see Shefflin take up an inter county role outside Kilkenny. Largely because it would’ve been thought he was likely to be the anointed heir to the throne whenever the great baseball-capped one should decide to dance the famous three step jig into the sunset. Of course he still may well be – and his current location would by no means be a bad spot to serve your time – but. and maybe it’s only me. it’s a little bit surprising not to see him take on a Kilkenny underage team first.
For his part, Fennelly has already garnered success for Offaly and with the Faithful County footballers also on the up under John Maughan it is a fine tribute to the progress overseen by Michael Duignan since he assumed the reins in his native land. What that in itself will do, though, is cause a degree of pondering in certain places.
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Not to be outdone, the musical chair season has been in full swing in football too. With some rather high profile alterations taking place. None more so than Jack O’Connor’s Third Testament in the Kingdom. From a neutral perspective, the only surprising thing is that it took so long for Kildare to appoint Glenn Ryan as their manager. Arguably the Shortgrass County’s greatest ever player, the Round Towers colossus has already built up a quite formidable managerial CV on the club scene in his native county and with Longford.
Given the multiple successful underage teams the Lilywhites have prodiced in recent years, the new Bainisteoir should have an abundance of talented footballers with which to work with. That’s without mentioning a backroom team made up of all white luminaries.
The one thing he might not have at his disposal is time. There are few more passionate counties about football than Kildare, but, that passion fuels an ongoing impatience for siccess which,in some ways puts the entire camp in a pressurised situation before a ball is kicked at all.
Still, knowing the lie of the land over there, the county will be enveloped in an excited optimism today. Same as it ever was. Same as every other county today. Not a bad position to be in.
In another corner of the country during the season’s first week, another nugget of GAA history was etched into the annals when Sligo and Leitrim partook in the first ever indoor fixture in the lifetime of the Association.
You know, while in some ways it doesn’t help itself, i. e. the refusal to introduce a countdown timer and hooter system or indeed a Video Referee or their non supporting of Proposal B, there have been some changes sanctioned over the years which have definitely improved football.
The kicking of frees and sideline balls from the hand, the introduction of the ‘Mark’ and HawkEye and the playing of matches under floodlights. Could indoor football be another avenue worth exploring?
Well, if the first exhibition thereof is anything to go by, here’s one individual who would gladly get a proper look at it. Now, anybody who has ever either played or observed indoor soccer will attest, things can get wild and manic. Not necessarily in a bad way though.
Whatever about Kildare being impatient for success, there are surely none more the opposite of that attribute than the folk of Lovely Leitrim. In sporting and all other ways, they just keep on keeping on.
Sligo may have won the historic match in the Connacht Dome, but Leitrim will see the positives in it. If every game in the Dome ends up 1-20 to 1-17, plenty more will too!
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