After 80 f inals, Séamus’s farewell to Croker

WITH both Waterford and Galway hoping to end a long spell without the Liam MacCarthy Cup, today is set to be a historic occasion. But for stadium event controller Séamus Ó Midheach, the final whistle will be a bittersweet moment.

The Kildare man, pictured, will oversee his 80th – and last – All-Ireland final. Since starting here in 1980, he has seen generations of GAA stars play on the hallowed turf at Jones’s Road.

This year, security is on high alert – and has been all season – but Mr Mr Ó Midheach, 63, says the threat from terror is nothing new. ‘People need to remember that all through the Eighties we regularly had loyalist paramilitaries threatening to bomb the place,’ he said.

Today’s match will, hopefully, be characterised by its friendly atmosphere. Mr Ó Midheach said: ‘We had a senior police officer from Scotland to see how we operate and he was dumbfounded that there was no segregation of fans. I think that’s an Irish thing: opposing fans will sit next to each other, there will be heated exchanges but after the final whistle, it’s forgotten about.’