FOUL PLAY REALLY DOES PAY

Players clearly prepared to gamble on cynicism if it gets them the desired result

THE REAL measure of Colm Cooper’s greatness is that, even after hanging up his boots, he is still able to deliver passes for free. There was a great rib-tickling line in the wonderful Conor’s Sketches mini mockumentary on Cooper’s retirement last week where – in his Paul Galvin persona – he recalls how Gooch once missed an entire game after ‘sleeping out’, but still had a great match, ‘scoring 1-5, 1-3 from play’.

Cooper wasn’t quite so spectacular last Sunday night in the RTE studio, but for old time’s sake he went off on one of those decoy runs that allowed a team-mate to run through the middle untouched.

It was, of course, all the more remarkable given that Cooper wasn’t even there. That he can still catch the eye when he is no longer visible is surely a measure of his genius.

Either that or it sets the tape on the obsession of some that is bordering on the unhealthy.

There will surely not be a more delicious slice of irony served up this television year than listening to Joe Brolly – after spending the entire week on the airwaves, from Today With Sean O’Rourke to local hospital radio, before taking time out to clear a rainforest so there was enough paper for him to write about it, as well – declare that the over-reaction to Cooper’s retirement was comparable to Lady Di’s eulogy. Not that Anthony Maher should be complaining, after all he didn’t get the ‘forget about him as a man’ treatment that Joe doled out to Seán Cavanagh.

The ferocity of that attack in the aftermath of the latter’s tackle on Conor McManus was wrongly credited with the introduction of football’s black card – it had been approved six months prior to that 2013 quarter-final – but it articulated the frustration of those who believe the game was being poisoned by a culture of cynical fouling.

It still is. True, Maher’s pull-down on Michael Fitzsimons last Sunday, 47 metres from goal, was only a blood relative to the foul that denied McManus a match-changing goal, but they were both underpinned by the belief that it absolutely pays to foul. But instead of outrage, Maher’s foul has, in the main, been greeted by nodding heads and an acceptance that it was a black card well worth taking.

And, of course it was, but in its inception it was a card that was supposed to be played as a deterrent and not as the trump to close out the final hand.

In many ways, it was fitting that it was the game’s definitive moment because the most disturbing eulogy paid last weekend is the one that suggested that the League final is the way the game should be played.

Sure, it was epic and thrilling; with passages of sublime play and a rollicking finale to warp it all up, but it was also one where the brilliance of the game’s top two teams defied the fouling culture that is eating away at the game.

Referee Paddy Neilan was credited for officiating with a light touch – and he did – yet the free-count at the end ran at 52, and just three of those were awarded for technical frees. In a 70-minute game, which, when you take into account actual game-time is more than one free per minute.

Dublin and Kerry might find a way to sugar that sauce but others in the months ahead will fail miserably and the game ‘as it should be played’ will not taste so sweet.

Football needs a new way – not abandoning the principle of the black card which has done a lot more good than harm – but in taking a uniform approach to all foul play.

It should deal with all cautionary offences, ensuring there is no separation in terms of punishment between yellow and black. Serial fouling, which is uncontrolled, should be addressed through the use of a sin-bin which would seek to punish the fouling team rather than the individual.

And professional fouls committed at the death – where there is not enough left on the clock for a full 10-minute sin-bin – should be additionally punished with frees awarded in the scoring zone against the fouling team.

While the concept that players can actually foul themselves out of games for committing ‘ordinary decent fouls’ should also be in play.

Last Sunday four Kerry players committed a minimum of three fouls or more, Paul Geaney (35th minute), Donnchadh Walsh (43rd), David Moran (49th) and Ronan Shanahan (65th); while Philly McMahon and Brian Fenton had reached that watermark by the 46th and 55th minutes respectively.

There should be a price for that, best paid by players being forced out of the game for 10-minute periods with a wired-up fourth official providing back-up to the match referee to keep count.

While that will lead to the usual moan that it would not be enforceable at club level, we should still start legislating for where it is.

Because the game in the shop window – even when it puts its best foot forward like it did last Sunday – remains a mess, and is one that Gooch cannot be expected to keep distracting us from. IT WAS interesting to read this week that the Cork County Board is to ‘help’ supporters purchase premium seat packages at the soon-to-bereopened Páirc Uí Franc.

Call me an old cynic, but surely that offer of ‘help’ screams more of a distressed signal from the committee charged with raising the shortfall in the €80m project to bridge the significant gap State and GAA funding does not meet.

The ‘priority at Páirc Uí Chaoimh’ scheme, which was limited to 2,000 seats on the middle tier of the new three-tier south stand, is a central plank in making up that shortfall. But then it was never likely to be an easy sell, certainly not at the mega cost of €6,500 per seat for a 10-year ticket.

For that, patrons secured access to all inter-county Championship and League games, club matches and the odd Garth Brooks (or other) concert thrown in for good measure.

The board’s offer of help – the details are scant but most likely would allow would-be purchasers to avail of a loan facility through a financial institutional – is unlikely to be seized upon by many.

The bottom line is that 650 euros a year is the equivalent of eight stand tickets for an AllIreland final and enough change for a bag of chips for nourishment on the way home.

That is a something you might find a proud Cork man willing to open his wallet for.

But what’s on offer here is a bird’s eye view of just how far they have fallen and they hardly need a bank loan to add to that misery.