FEEL-GOOD FOOTBALL NOT THE RULE
The thrills and spills produced on the League’s opening night don’t hide game’s obvious ills
AWEEKEND of Gaelic football when it was hard not to get caught up in the sugar rush, especially with the best bits packaged for primetime TV.
On Saturday evening Mickey Harte once again spooked the locals down in Kerry. The figurehead of Ulster’s New Wave, whose Tyrone tormented them in the noughties, returned in the unlikely guise of Derry manager.
Still happy to do what it takes to upset Gaelic football’s old order. Turning over Kerry in front of a partisan Tralee crowd wouldn’t have happened without the surprise inclusion of Glen trio Conor Glass, Ethan Doherty and Ciarán McFaul just six days after the club’s landmark All-Ireland triumph.
It was a gripping, very modern affair as both teams matched highly organised defensive setups with some swift counterattacking play and roaming fly goalkeepers.
Then Dublin-Monaghan was a revelation. Stephen O’Hanlon epitomised the sense of liberation with a goal-of-the-year contender into the Hill 16 end — one cameo in a display that rightly drew rave reviews.
If Dublin conceding three goals at home was a shock, so too was the sight of Rolls Royce midfielder Brian Fenton coughing out a bit of dirty petrol — giving away the ball for one final turnover in a breathless finish to a breathless Division 1 clash.
After waiting since the end of last July for the inter-county season to come along, it was back with a bang.
And there was a familiar theme to the feel-good factor it generated.
Lee Keegan caught the mood on Allianz League Sunday. ‘We prayed for attacking football for long enough. We probably banished football for long enough with negativity. But there was very little to give out about this weekend. I think it’s the perfect opening in terms of what we wanted, what we’ve seen — definitely not what we expected.
‘Even take the two Division 1 games last night, we had six goals in two games. It’s very rare we had that last year in any game. So I mean we can talk about football in a bad light but this weekend was good for the soul to see teams express themselves and go at each other.
‘It’s probably just down to the League again. It’s probably the best format of the competition in terms of what we have. So teams do take the League in some terms seriously. It was a breath of fresh air to see, particularly the Dublin Monaghan game.
‘We probably won’t see too many games like that — open, attack — but it was really good to watch. Two teams that said let’s go at it and see what happens.’
Donegal All-Ireland winner Éamon McGee said what plenty were thinking: ‘I enjoyed those two games this evening Derry/ Kerry and Dublin/Monaghan and also coming off a great club final. Does Gaelic really need that much fixing?’
Eh, yes it does.
This is like watching Cillian Murphy in Oppenheimer, Barry Keoghan in Saltburn and Andrew Scott in All Of Us Strangers and imagining that every other movie made this past year is a potential Best Picture Oscar nomination.
Unfortunately, outside of the Alist talent, there are a lot of bad actors and B movies out there, a lot that is under-resourced and under-produced.
It’s the box office hit that is the rarity.
And the weekend just gone was an example of this type of exceptionalism.
These players and these teams are the cream of the crop.
Glass and Fenton are two of the best midfielders in the game, part of elite, high-performing set-ups where tactical plays are highly choreographed and the players are superbly coached and organised.
Jack O’Connor, Harte and Dessie Farrell have inter-county CVs that glisten and serious football nous while Vinny Corey is quickly proving himself a worthy heir to Monaghan’s Ulster title-winning former manager Malachy O’Rourke, now making history with Glen.
Croke Park plays big and fast — by its very nature, it encourages an expansive, up-tempo type of game.
Keegan’s positive words were revealing in a different way.
He admitted that this was ‘definitely not what we expected…’ that’s because of all the ‘negativity’ and talk of ‘football in a bad light’.
Gaelic football has been wrapped up in a tortuous debate over whether the game is becoming unwatchable. Radical rule changes were trialled at Freshers level in college competitions pre-Christmas for just that reason. It’s why changes such as kickouts having to cross the 45 and frees and sidelines not being allowed go backwards between the two 20-metre lines were trialled.
Allied to imbalanced and often uncompetitive provincial championships — Ulster the proud exception — the problems go way deeper than the inter-county game.
It’s down the grades of club and colleges and underage and schools.
Just look at the gnashing of teeth over the recent Ulster schools football game, the MacRory Cup tactical stalemate between St Pat’s Maghera and St Mary’s Magherafelt.
The examples of poor club teams trying to mirror flexible and fluid inter-county gameplans — but without the skillset or athleticism to make them work – are legion.
The cream of the crop in Division 1 are not the best guide to what actually has so many watching the game so concerned. Keegan’s line gave the impression of a devil-may-care attitude at Croke Park. A ‘just go out and play football’ approach. As if the whole set-up and tactical approach was not seriously thought through, carefully calibrated and planned.
One which involves taking that leap of faith — to go at the game. To be active, not passive, particularly out of possession.
To see Jim McGuinness’ Donegal embrace the high press and be so front-foot minded suggests that the counter-revolution may already be upon us.
In Salthill on Sunday, I landed around noon for a 1.45pm throwin. Even at that early stage, there was a long queue already snaking its way outside the back of the main stand at Pearse Stadium. Mainly Mayo supporters judging by the colours of the jackets, hoodies and woolly hats on show who had hit the road early to avoid the usual congestion around Salthill and who were now waiting for the turnstiles to open.
No official attendance was given but one of the local groundsmen reckoned there could have been eight or nine thousand in the ground.
Mayo were rewarded for being smart and incisive and positive in their approach while Galway were the opposite — timid and passive in the first half when they had the gale at their back.
That caution and conservatism was doubly exposed when Mayo’s Ryan O’Donoghue was blackcarded — and still Galway didn’t press man-to-man, allowing the visiting side to play keep-ball and knock chunks off the clock.
And this from a team that are meant to be smart or talented enough to be All-Ireland contenders.
And while Mayo were hugely impressive, just remember it was the Mayo county final only last October that caused an outcry over where the game was going. That one featured Ballina Stephenites and Breaffy and a clutch of the same players on show on Sunday.
It finished 0-6 to 0-4 in Ballina’s favour. No starting Breaffy player managed a score from play.
It’s a beguiling idea that maybe all is okay with Gaelic football. It resonates because we want to believe it. Any fan of the game wants Gaelic football to be best version of itself.
But there is an element of wishfulfilment in the rush to wideeyed judgement.
“The county scene was back with a bang”
“The problems go down all the grades”
“These players are the cream of the crop”