Priority of a manager to win games

WE feel the pain of those who believe that the advent of hurling’s sweeper system has diminished the game as a spectacle.

Those in hurling’s brain trust that press the case that it has added intrigue to the game should be locked in a room and made watch last Sunday’s grim Waterford/Wexford quarter-final on the loop until they can recite by heart every backward and lateral hit pass that was made.

But it is not enough for those opposed to defensive-nuanced game-plans to simply declare ‘down with that sort of thing’ or as Michael Duignan of this parish proposed that sweepers be ‘banned.’

How exactly would that work out? Would any member of a defending team 40 metres from his own posts not seen to be manmarking a direct opponent face being red-carded?

It is hard to take those who simply want this game-plan to vanish into the night seriously, especially when it allowed counties like Waterford and Wexford to gain a competitive foothold in the game.

And if opponents to the sweeper system are so appalled, why aren’t we hearing the kind of medicine that was suggested for football a few years back, when there was talk of limiting the number of attacking players that could cross the half-way line.

Ah, the introduction of an ‘offside’ rule in hurling might be no sport; it would be fun to see hurling folk recoiling in horror if it ever made it as far as the debate stage.

Still, it has a far better chance of working than those who believe that wishful thinking will force managers and coaches whose core duty is to win games rather than glorify the sport to change their ways.

Nor should we expect them to.