WEXFORD REVOLUTION IS MORE BARN DANCE THAN RIVERDANCE

Contrasting language sums up innner conflict which rages in hurling

THE POETRY has left Liam Griffin, replaced by the industrial language of the building site. Last Monday morning, he was an obvious point of contact for RTE Radio One’s Morning Ireland after Wexford had confirmed their return to the Allianz Hurling League’s top flight.

Of the many fires Davy Fitzgerald has lit in his time this is as impressive as any; taking a county that hasn’t even contended since being relegated in 2011 back to the top with a round still to play.

They have much, then, to celebrate and when Griffin was quizzed by Darren Frehill as to whether a system-based game plan was a price worth paying, he was unequivocal.

‘To tell you the truth if they brought the ball up the field in a wheelbarrow it would not bother me. We can’t afford to be purists yet but maybe in time we can be,’ he insisted. There must have been hard-core hurling fundamentalists out there who were left choking on their cornflakes.

After all, it was another colourful turn of phrase that Griffin will be long associated with when he proclaimed hurling to be the Riverdance of sport after leading Wexford to their last All-Ireland win in 1996.

Two decades on, the metaphor that best suits the game comes in the form of a wheelbarrow rather than a joyful jig.

Has there ever been a more stark or eloquent articulation of the jour- ney that hurling has taken from the visceral assault on the senses to the tactical scrawl on the whiteboard?

From a stage where the game danced to its natural rhythm to a transporter of bricks and mortar on a building site, Griffin’s contrasting language sums up the inner conflict which rages inside hurling.

The notion that any game can survive while remaining stagnant is folly but equally, in an era where analysis is king, the observation that some have opted to make it too complex for its own good is just as valid a point to make.

Last Saturday night’s Kilkenny and Tipperary Allianz League game which was played with such abandon and intensity we feared those who believe that the game should be played on a grid rather than grass might throw-up on their iPads.

There was that three-minute-plus sequence of unbroken play in the final quarter where, in the absence of fear, the ball was turned over probably 20 times in a club sandwich of hooks, tackles, handling errors and whatever sauce you want to put on it yourself.

You just know that some of the game’s modern architects are going to knock weekend seminars out of those three minutes to advise that this is not how you play a winning game.

The thing is, though, the two teams that gave that exhibition also happen to be the best in the land.

That has not happened by accident; both have evolved but have done so by staying true to their faith.

Tipperary’s forward movement – a legacy of Eamonn O’Shea’s first stint as coach – ensures that they always play the percentage game when they go direct.

As for Kilkenny, this perception that Brian Cody is some kind of tactics free-zone is utterly ridiculous, it is just he keeps it simple so that it fits perfectly with the players he has and the style he loves.

Paddy Stapleton, the former Tipemploying

It wouldn’t bother me if the ball was brought up the field in a wheelbarrow

perary defender, in an excellent online blog written prior to last weekend’s game, pointed out that the key to Cody’s game plan was that he liked to go direct not only because he trusted he had the offensive targets to win sufficient ball, but also it meant that it allowed his half-back line to sit deep and protect.

And after that they just turn up the heat to ensure that they are in place to gobble up the turnovers.

Of course, it does not always work – last year’s All-Ireland final a point in case – and he may soon not have the stuff to win playing like that.

But it still represents his and Kilkenny’s best chance. And the hard evidence is there to prove it. For all of hurling’s new ways, a system-based team has still to win an All-Ireland. Even when Fitzgerald went to the 2013 All-Ireland final with Clare, he diluted his system for the final to go after Cork in a more orthodox manner and was rewarded in a shoot-out.

Derek McGrath has worked miracles in Waterford, but last year there was a pronounced change of emphasis that almost carried the day for them when they faced Kilkenny twice.

Griffin is right in that for now the wheelbarrow is serving Wexford well but it will only take them so far.

Because in a dance-off between the high-tempo, high-kicking Riverdancers and those who opt for a joyless shuffle up and down the floor, we all know who gets the girl in the end.