Have wheels will travel… If only the opportunity was afforded

FOGRA: This writer hates repetition as much as the rest of ye. But, rather the deploying my usual line of justification about matters retaining relevance over time, with what you will read hereafter, the drum will be banged until it smashes and the stick falls out its ar** end. Now read on…

There he was. Again. Of course my gripe wasn’t with him. Never was, isn’t or never will. Rather, the shifting of the goalposts and those who facilitate it. Let it be made absolutely clear, I have zero problems with Jamie Wall. In actual fact, I find the Corkman nothing short of inspirational in how he has re-routed his life’s journey after it was devastatingly thrown off course.

What’s more, those who have facilitated his continued involvement in GAA – Mary I College in Limerick – whom he sensationally guided to Fitzgibbon Cup glory in February 2024 – and the wonderful people in Sport TG4 who give his unique perspective and insightful analysis a wholly merited platform.

You know, I would never be surprised if in due course Jamie were to end up manager of the Cork senior hurlers or at least part of the management thereof.

Anyway, he is mentioned in what you are reading because on Sunday last, and only as it should be, he was pitchside doing punditry as part of the Irish language station’s excellent coverage of the All Ireland Club SHC Final between Dublin’s Na Fianna and Sarsfields of Cork.

But here’s the kick in the guts. Not only are other wheelchairs not allowed within an ass’s roar of the pitch, the GAA’s long peddled lie about there being no wheelchair access in the Hogan Stand been exposed by a combination of Cuala clubman Sean Drummond and his compatriot Des Cahill of RTE Sport.

What’s more, as frustrating and, yes, degrading as it is trying to watch football from the current ‘facilities’ in the Cusack  Stand, how in the name of who or whatever is steering the ship up yonder people watch hurling therefrom baffles me.

Even allowing for the fact I have only the one functioning optical organ, on the one occasion it was attempted – a Kilkenny-Waterford All Ireland semi final for which Meath-Mayo All Ireland SFC quarter final was the curtain lifter – and one may as well have been trying to identify individual midges on a bullock’s back. That said, the opportunity to ‘see’ Tommy Walsh, Henry Shefflin and John Mullane in action couldn’t be passed up.

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As many of you will no doubt know at this stage, I retained the highest of hopes for a lot of issues within the GAA – not least the one dearest to my heart – with the election of Mr Burns as Uachtaran CLG. But, in what has been a real gut punch, so far, the result has been anything but excellent.

That is to say, the only response has been an acknowledgement from Jarlath’s office of my original email of 28/5/2024. Since then, you’d have got more sound out of the red coated guards outside Buckingham Palace.

So, with Sunday last supposedly the day of the clubs, this here keyboard got clacking again in the lead up to same. One bone of contention which has long been aired in this space, the alleged lack of disabled viewing facilities in the Hogan Stand, wouldn’t be an issue on the occasion with the Cusack also open. But the issue relating to access to the press facilities on the seventh floor of the Hogan Stand still clouds the horizon as well as things like somebody in a similar position to Jamie (Wall). As in, I would be very interested to see what the line from the higher echelons of the GAA were a team managed by him were to have a fixture slated for the association’s HQ.

Instinct is to think the impropriety of having a wheelchair anywhere near the pitch or indeed on it would be swept under the carpet. Again, that is not said out of bitterness towards Jamie, or anybody else for that matter, just an endorsement that, with the GAA, things are never quite as they seem.

For instance, even if taking the perspective of the disabled media head off the table for a second, the deal, so to speak, for ordinary disabled fans, is not exactly covered in velvet either. Between the shameful view, the meandering, exhaustive logistics of actually getting there and, to be honest, the real boot in the backside is the reality that disabled viewing tickets are only issued to the Co Boards of participating teams.

Thus, last Sunday, it would have been a case of have wheels, will travel, if only the opportunity was afforded. Where we all belong? Certainly doesn’t feel like it.