Cusack: set a standard for sliotars
DÓNAL ÓG CUSACK has called on the GAA to introduce a standardised sliotar for hurling as soon as possible. The Clare coach and former Cork goalkeeper refused to discuss the theft of current Rebels ’keeper Anthony Nash’s sliotars before last Sunday’s Munster final. It’s understood that the individual who stole the bag and threw it into the Killinan End terrace in Thurles had links to the Clare management team. Cusack said that the Clare management had dealt with that issue in a statement on Tuesday and declined to add to it. But he spoke at length about what he termed the pressing need to introduce a standard sliotar to the game. Cusack, who quit punditry to work with Clare, revealed that he identified various instances of sliotar skullduggery, without commenting on them publicly. ‘On The Sunday Game sometimes I’d be watching out for things,’ he said. ‘I saw things happening
in the Championship a couple of years ago. I watched it, and I looked around at everybody else but nobody else picked it up. And it was around sliotars. So I said nothing. ‘Because when there is not a standard, these things will happen. I remember when I was playing I would file off (sliotar rims) because I wanted to hit a consistent shot. ‘I would be filing the rims down to take the edge off them because when I was playing I wanted that consistent ball all the time.’ GAA Director of Games Pat Daly stated earlier this year that efforts are under way to launch standardised, micro-chipped sliotars in time for spring 2018. There has been no confirmation of this yet though and with around a dozen different sliotar manufacturers providing balls, Cusack argued that it is badly needed. ‘There is such a difference between balls,’ continued the Cloyne man. ‘Every ball I see now has an official stamp on it but some balls still travel 20 yards further than others and waver in the air. ‘If you went around club matches and got 10 balls and got the same man striking them, he’d strike them different distances. ‘I’d fully support standardising the ball because everyone is on the one playing field.’ Cusack revealed how the lack of a standard sliotar led to him pulling off a bold act of gamesmanship in the 2005 Munster final against Tipperary. ‘We practised it, that if there was a penalty given, that one of us would cause a diversion, give out to the referee, whatever,’ said Cusack. ‘And that another ball, we’d roll in. ‘You’d be planning things like that but it might never come off. But then in the Munster final, ball comes in, Diarmuid O’Sullivan gives away a penalty and everyone kicks into gear. ‘That ball that was in use is driven away and the other ball was rolled in. I remember looking at Eoin Kelly and I says to myself, “that ball is not going to go as hard as you think it’s going to go”,’ added Cusack, who recalled that Cork saved Kelly’s penalty.