PAST PAIN DRIVES TRIBE
Galway still haunted by controversial 1989 defeat to Tipperary
‘Conspiracy theories still have life to this day’
ONE video of the 1989 All-Ireland hurling semi-final between Galway and Tipperary has been viewed by more than 20,000 people on YouTube. But it’s not that number that catches the eye, it is the bitterness and rancour in the comments below. Even now, almost 28 years after one of the most controversial GAA matches of all time, deep and painful wounds remain.
Conspiracy theories abounded west of the Shannon in the harsh winter of 1989 and they still have life to this day. Galway were going for their third All-Ireland title in a row, something that did not sit well with the traditionalist element within the GAA. So, every roadblock possible was placed in their path. That is what was thought back then — and maybe what some think still.
You don’t need those countless re-runs of Reeling in the Years to know that Ireland was a fairly grim place in the 1980s. But amid all the emigration, the duffel coats and protest marches at insanely high income tax rates, there was the Galway hurlers.
From one end of the decade to the other, Galway splashed a bit of colour across the gloom. From Joe Connolly’s cry ‘people of Galway, we love you’ to Joe McDonagh seranading Croke Park with a rendition of The West’s Awake to Gerry McInerney’s white boots, there was something thrilling about the Tribesmen.
Tipperary had famously ended their 16-year Munster title famine in 1987 but they found their own way to Liam McCarthy blocked by a maroon force. And it was clear by 1989 that Galway had Tipp’s number.
They had played three big games in Croke Park and the Tribesmen emerged victorious on each occa- sion — the 1987 All-Ireland semifinal, which was the best pure hurling clash of this rivalry, where Noel Lane’s two goals set the platform for the win, the 1988 final when Lane again snaffled the decisive goal and the 1989 League final, played on the final day of April.
There may have been a hint of shadow-boxing about it (neither Pat Fox nor Nicky English lined out for Tipp) but Galway still won an entertaining game, 2-16 to 4-8.
As rivalries go, this seemed pretty one-sided. But all of that was to change by events of that particular summer.
A few days after claiming the League title, Cyril Farrell and his players went to New York for the All-Stars exhibition match. Tony Keady, the 1988 Hurler of the Year, decided to stick around the Big Apple after that match.
He had been asked by a Galway man who was in charge of the Laois club in New York to play a championship game against the Tipperary club. So on May 21, 1989, Keady made a fateful decision that would have repercussions all the way across the Atlantic.
Along with Michael Helebert and Aidan Staunton, Keady lent a hand as Laois trounced Tipperary. He played under the pseudonym ‘Bernard Keady.’ Keady admitted years later than he was torn on whether to play or not. But the practice of top county players flying into Gaelic Park for a game had been going on for years and a blind eye was always turned to it. Why should it be any different for the best hurler in the game?
The New York board met a few weeks later and decided that all three players had played without official sanction and they were suspended for two games. However, the Games Administration Committee in Croke Park decided to make an example out of Keady, in the hope of stamping out this practice and suspended him, and the other two players, for a full year.
Galway kicked up. The story went from the back pages to the front pages when there was a suggestion that the All-Ireland champions were going to withdraw from that year’s Championship. For almost a week, a sense of uncertainty hung over the entire Championship.
The appeal against Keady’s suspension was defeated 20-18 at Central Council level. Despite the conspiracy theories, Tipperary voted to reinstate Keady but four Connacht counties — Mayo, Sligo, Roscommon and Leitrim — were among those who voted against it.
In his biography, True Grit, Sylvie Linnane, the flame-haired stalwart of the Galway full-back line, suggested the whole thing left a sour taste.
‘Galway should have handled the whole business in a smarter, more determined way. They should have withdrawn from the Championship and informed the GAA of their decision. Or else, they should have accepted the bad news, and got on with the defence of their title, without thinking twice about the injustice of it all.’
But the injustice lingered into the semi-final against Tipperary. Antrim had caused the shock of the century in the curtain-raiser by beating Offaly, raising the stakes even higher. The second semi-final was effectively to decide that year’s All-Ireland.
And the performance of John Denton, the referee from Wexford, is a topic that still gets debated to this day.
Last year, Galway legend Pete Finnerty was a subject in Laochra
Gael, TG 4’s superb GAA documentary series. When the focus turned to that controversial game, it was all about Denton’s display.
Not simply his decision to send off Linnane and Michael ‘Hopper’ McGrath on a chaotic afternoon in Croke Park, but also his failure to dismiss John Leahy for a reckless pull on Finnerty.
It just enhanced the whole sense of injustice they were feeling west of the Shannon.
‘There were a few crazy decisions,’ Finnerty remarked on the documentary.
‘Sylvie tussling for the ball and the next thing Nicky falls to the ground. I couldn’t believe what was happening. I think Nicky was looking for a free, he wasn’t looking to get Sylvie sent off. Sylvie got his marching orders but did not deserve to be sent off.’
As Farrell, the manager of that Galway team, would later write in his autobiography: ‘The sending-off of ‘Hopper’ McGrath compounded our frustration. With McGrath gone, we felt that we had to beat Tipperary, the Games Administration Committee, the Central Council and the referee.’
The world was against them on that August afternoon in 1989.
It is something that still hurts almost three decades later and it is why a bit of needle is always guaranteed when Galway and Tipperary clash.