Life under lockdown an unusual experience for O’Neill and family
AFTER five rounds of matches, the Airtricity League Premier Division season ground to a premature halt on March 12 due to Covid-19. Shamrock Rovers had a 100% record at the time, three points clear of champions Dundalk.
Since then, Gary O’Neill has remained in Dublin, away from his Tralee family, and, like an awful lot of people, he has been financially affected by the pandemic as Shamrock Rovers employees have taken a 25% pay cut since mid-April.
“Yeah, I’ve been in Dublin since lockdown began. Both my dad and brother work in University Hospital Kerry, so I thought it would be better to stay here on my own, even though that makes it even more monotonous than it already is. But I’ve been okay, we have had our Zoom calls and training schedule to do. I’ve kept things ticking over.
“Dad is logistics manager in the hospital and my brother works in the stores. They have just been really, really busy. Normally they would be on the strict nine-to-five schedule, but my brother could be doing a night shift now from 2am to 11 in the morning. It’s just a weird time for them, as it has been for everybody else.
“We have taken 25% cuts at Rovers but we are very fortunate to be in the vast minority of clubs that are still being paid at all. The club have been very good to us, when you consider that they have no income, apart maybe from some online sales of jerseys and equipment.
“You can look at it and say that this is a year of your contract and your career that you won’t be getting back, but they could have pulled the plug entirely on us like other clubs have done. We could have all been made redundant, like we have seen at a club like St Pat’s. And that’s not a dig at anybody. That is the reality of life in the League of Ireland. I am just thankful to be at this club.”
With Shamrock Rovers one of the four Airtricity League teams preparing for European competition sometime later this year, O’Neill and his colleagues began a Covid-19 testing regime on Monday, May 25. So far, so good, as not a single positive test has been recorded among the four clubs. Getting swabbed is not supposed to be a pleasant experience though?
“Whoever told you that, I’ll vouch for it! It’s not very nice at all. We’ve gone for the temperature and swab for testing. There’s a lady sitting in a room, in an open hall, you fill out a form and then she takes a swab from the back of your throat.
“She has to kind of make you gag to get a proper reading. It’s very unpleasant, but it only takes five or six seconds. It’s brilliant that every player and member of the staff at the four clubs are negative. That shows that everybody has been looking after themselves.
“Bohs were caught out a bit in recent days, so they must be delighted with the results. If they had recorded a few positive tests, it wouldn’t have looked good on their part after they were found to be doing some group training in a public park.
“That’s pretty black and white as being against the rules of the FAI. We are all itching to get back as soon as possible, but you can’t have one rule for one team and one rule for another.”
Shamrock Rovers returned to socially distant training in small groups on Monday and, speaking over the weekend, O’Neill was not afraid of getting back to work.
“It’s just all out of the norm, isn’t it? Nobody knows really what to expect. I wouldn’t be frightened. The only thing I would be concerned about is not bringing this virus near my family.
“I just want everything to run properly. We will be training in groups of five players, we can’t be together, but it will be just great to have that schedule again. You would have a spring in your step to get out of bed on Monday morning and to see the lads again.”
The first competitive action since March for the Tralee man may well be in late July or early August with the FAI planning a four-team tournament at a neutral venue involving the four Euro qualifiers – Rovers, Dundalk, Bohemians and Derry City.
However, some of the other Premier Division teams are not happy as they cannot return to training for another three weeks now, and feel they may be at a competitive disadvantage when, and if, the league season restarts.
“Yeah, I can definitely see the two sides of the coin here. I can understand the FAI’s viewpoint, because they want to give the four teams the best possible chance in Europe, to generate a bit of income, that’s where the money is.
“On the other hand, the other clubs would like to have a plan. If I was at St Pat’s, still redundant, I would want to know: when can I train again? When can I earn money again? I am a Shamrock Rovers player, and it’s great, because we can try and get as fit as we can for the Europa League Qualifiers.”
A restart date for the domestic league is still up in the air, with constant rumour and speculation the order of the day. Clarity may arrive later this week with a meeting between the FAI and the clubs set for Thursday.
“It’s one of those things, you hear something new every day. There is talk of August to December, talk of October to February. We just have to play it by ear. “I would love to do the winter season of October to February, then have March off, and start the new 2021 campaign in April. But it will all depend on what’s sustainable for all clubs. They are all in different financial conditions.
“We won our first five games, things were looking good, and momentum is huge in the Airtricity League. The stoppage couldn’t have come at a worse time for us, but at least we are not going to be starting again with a blank sheet.”