FITZGERALD BLASTS ANNUAL FIXTURES CLASH AS FARCICAL
COROFIN’S Kieran Fitzgerald has slammed the three-month wait for an All-Ireland club football semi-final as ‘madness’ and described the latest club versus colleges fixture clash as ‘farcical’. For the second year in a row, Corofin duo Kieran Molloy and Liam Silke could have dual commitments this coming weekend. Silke made headlines 12 months ago with his dash from Offaly to Dublin to come on as a substitute for NUIG in the Sigerson Cup final defeat to UCD, straight after inspiring Corofin to victory over Moorefield in Tullamore. While a potential Sigerson semifinal with NUIG against UCC has been switched to Sunday, Silke could be faced with a direct clash as his college UCD are down to play on Saturday if they progress that far, the same afternoon Corofin take on Ulster club champions Gaoth Dobhair. ‘It is farcical,’ said Corofin veteran Fitzgerald. ‘For two years in a row the Sigerson has been denied the two of them. ‘I know Kieran got on for 20 minutes last year but they were due to miss out completely this year. One game has been moved but it means playing twice in two days and you’re talking player welfare. Our game against Gaoth Dobhair will be hell for leather, no holding back and asking someone to do it again the next day is not good enough.’ The drawn-out nature of the club championships means Corofin have spent much of the winter training for this one match, a bugbear for Fitzgerald who isn’t alone in wishing the competition could be played out in the calendar year. ‘It’s mentally draining, training on poor pitches. Physically you’d be fine but you’re slogging away and there’s 60 days to go for 60 minutes of football. It is crazy and it has to change. ‘If you had someone from another sporting body and you explained to them that these guys are training for 60, 70 days for one game they’d think it was mad. ‘From a GAA point of view, before Christmas it is all club; county finals and provincial finals dominate what’s happening at the time. Then all of a sudden it just stops and then when it comes back it gets lost. ‘If it was structured a bit better you could have a club final two weeks before Christmas and I don’t think any club player would have a problem with that — playing under lights in Croke Park. Then the club season is
finished and the inter-county season can move on.’ As someone who won an All-Ireland and All-Star with Galway in 2001 and went on to captain his county, he admitted he would love to see the team embrace a more attacking style than the defensive set-up employed by Kevin Walsh. ‘I’d prefer to see more of the traditional style. I don’t think that sort of game is going to win you an All-Ireland,’ he said. For someone who turned 38 last month, Fitzgerald shows no sign of pulling the curtain down, even if there are times in the dressing room he feels his age, as a conversation with Gaoth Doghair’s Kevin Cassidy confirmed. ‘Myself and Kevin were talking about it; we were both on an All-Stars tour in 2002 to Los Angeles. I’m sharing a dressingroom now with guys who are just out of minor. It’s hard at times to relate to them but I enjoy it. It’s good craic but we’re at entirely different stages in life. ‘You’re talking about mortgages and they’re talking about going out on the town on a Thursday night in Galway. They think I’m nearly part of the management team!’