10 OF THE BIGGEST TURNING POINTS OF 2017
ASK them why they did what they did in a given moment and most sportspeople won’t have a coherent answer. Especially at the elite level, they answer to instincts they themselves struggle to explain, let alone trying to share them with those of us gawping on.
These are the acts that steal the headlines and make stars.
However, some of the biggest calls in 2017 took place not in the crucible of action but away from it: tactical calls, operational decisions, panicked switches and steps into brave new worlds.
The year almost gone had them all.
O’NEILL’S HALF-TIME HORROR
IRELAND were in a good deal of trouble at half-time against Denmark. After a dour but commendable first-leg performance in Copenhagen, the return game in Dublin got off to a tremendous start with an early goal from Shane Duffy. Denmark’s eventual equaliser was no surprise, though, and when a mistake by Stephen Ward, which was characteristic of Ireland’s haplessness, helped put the visitors 2-1 up at half time, the extent of the problems were becoming apparent. Martin O’Neill’s (right) reaction turned difficulty into a crisis, however. He removed the two midfielders most capable of tackling, David Meyler and Harry Arter, and put on Wes Hoolahan and Aiden McGeady. Humiliation duly followed — and the fantasists who claim Ireland can compete by playing an attacking style got their answer.
DONOGHUE’S CLEVER TRIBE
MICHEÁL DONOGHUE took a chance with Galway’s starting team for the All-Ireland hurling final. He picked Johnny Glynn in his forward line instead of Jason Flynn, favouring the strength and traditional attributes of the former over the speed and elusiveness of the latter. It worked but not in the way you might have supposed. While Glynn was solid, it was the introduction of Flynn that helped Galway win their first All-Ireland in 29 years. He came on and, along with another substitute, Niall Burke, scored four points — in a match that Galway won by three. It was a big, brave and brilliant call by Donoghue, trusting that Flynn would bring a threat to tiring Waterford legs with which they could not cope. On such decisions are titles often decided.
COLEMAN’S KO EXPOSES IRELAND
THE horrendous leg break suffered by Seamus Coleman last March exposed Ireland, on and off the field. He was the victim of a terrible tackle by Welsh player Neil Taylor, but after the shock cleared, the stark reality remained that Ireland would now have to try and qualify for the World Cup without their best player. As Ireland’s rudimentary methods failed to preserve an early advantage in the group that should have made automatic qualification achievable, the loss of the one player of undoubted class became more painfully felt. An unfortunate side-effect of the injury was the abuse directed at Taylor by some Irish supporters. Some of it was racist and even if this shameful conduct was the responsibility of a small minority, it was nonetheless a cause of embarrassment.
GAVIN SAYS ENOUGH
HE was tirelessly mocked after it, but Jim Gavin’s passionate, high-blown defence of Diarmuid Connolly (pictured together below) had a galvanising effect on Dublin’s season. The Leinster Championship is no challenge at all for the greatest team of modern times, and after a typically easy win in a provincial semi-final against Westmeath, Gavin cut loose. Connolly had been properly suspended after putting his hands on a linesman in Dublin’s first game of the summer against Carlow, but Gavin took grave exception to what he saw as unfair analysis of Connolly’s conduct, with The Sunday Game targeted and overwrought talk of rights in the Republic. However, in turning Connolly’s case into a cause, Gavin created a focus and a unity within his players they would have no reason to foster against hopeless Leinster opponents. That sense of grievance would serve them well as they powered to three in a row — helped, eventually, by Connolly.
CLUB PLAYERS STAND UP AND UNITE
IT was on the ninth day of the New Year that the most important GAA story of 2017 emerged. The Club Players Association was launched in the clubhouse of Ballyboden St Enda’s in south Dublin, and finally the silent people had a voice. They remain an irritant in the minds of many involved with the GAA, and there is a cohort in the media, too, who dismiss them as agitators for change that will never come. Don’t be so sure: the frustration felt by club players in their thousands around the country has been building for years, and they still wait for meaningful action to address their plight. What is needed is an acknowledgement that the inter-county game is now so great it is consuming everything in its path, and if clubs are to survive, either they are protected or the counties are tamed. There is no sign of either happening, but the CPA are not for turning.
McILROY’S LAST ROLL
THERE is nowhere to go after this. In deciding to dispense with his longserving caddy JP Fitzgerald, Rory McIlroy tinkered with the final moving part of his golfing operation. Clubs have been changed, coaches and putters too, and in deciding to break his professional relationship with Fitzgerald, McIlroy took drastic action in trying to return his game to past glories. If this doesn’t work, where does he go? He has already confirmed that his friend Harry Diamond, a talented amateur, will continue as his caddy for 2018, but the two had only a middling time of it in the events since Fitzgerald’s departure, with a fifthplace finish at the Bridgestone Invitational and second at the British Masters the relative highlights, after a season niggled by a persistent rib injury. He has dropped to tenth in the world rankings — it is seven years since he finished a season so low.
THE McGREGOR SHOW REACHES A GRUBBY END
BEFORE Conor McGregor was soundly beaten by Floyd Mayweather in the summer’s most lucrative gimmick, he was being compared to Muhammad Ali. His free deployment of racist language in the build-up to the bout was explained away by his supporters, and those members of the media who misplaced credible analysis and replaced it with cheerleading talked up his role in the most hyped event of the year. Four months on, McGregor (right) is no longer a sportsman but a one-man monument to bad taste. He was crass in an appearance in a Dublin court on speeding charges, before a night out in London in the company of two Dublin criminals. Those who championed him as one of the country’s leading sportsmen have the good sense to keep their heads down, while the UFC wonders if he will ever fight again. He made a fortune on the Mayweather spectacle, but any relevance he may have possessed has disappeared quickly since.
ZEBO’S NOVEMBER PAIN
ON October 23, news of Simon Zebo’s move to Racing 92 in France became public. On October 26, Joe Schmidt announced a squad for the November internationals. It included 38 players, and Zebo (left) wasn’t one of them. With that swift, decisive move, Schmidt reminded the world — and any Irish player with designs on a move abroad — that foreign travel came at the cost of a Test career. Remember that as you read of reported interest in other key Irish players. The IRFU’s system was heavily criticised in the aftermath of Zebo’s exclusion, but it works. And it is most certainly necessary. Yes, these are professional players and they have the right to maximise their earnings, but the success of the past two decades is founded to a critical extent on keeping players at home. Zebo understands that better than anyone now.
OLYMPICS RING THE CHANGES
THERE is no aspect of the sporting ecosystem duller than administrative manoeuvring, but rarely has a committee meeting been more important than the Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) held by the Olympic Council of Ireland in a Dublin city centre hotel in February. Sarah Keane (below) was elected president of the beleaguered council, and for the first time in months one could believe there was a future in which the Olympic movement in this country could be taken seriously. The time since has been consumed by cleaning up the mess left by the Rio ticketing debacle, with costs running to millions and the reputation of the OCI at a dismal low. However, Keane has big ambitions and is convinced it can play a big role in Irish life. Should she manage to prove this, a meeting in a nondescript ballroom will have started the revolution.
IRISH RULE CHELTENHAM
WITH a record 19 winners, 10 more than their British counterparts, Irish trainers ruled the Cheltenham Festival. Leading trainer was Gordon Elliott, and here at home he would get to within a day of taking the National Hunt trainers’ title from Willie Mullins. Elliott’s place among the elite in Irish training was symbolically sealed by his feats in Cheltenham, but it was six months’ coming. This year saw the manifestation of Michael O’Leary’s decision, taken in the autumn of 2016, to move his horses from Mullins to other Irish trainers after a disagreement over fees. Elliott was a major beneficiary, and the wisdom of O’Leary’s call was proved by what has happened since, particularly over four thrilling days in the Cotswolds.