|
|
 |
You are > Home > Relentless chase for reputable managers kicks off silly season
|
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Relentless chase for reputable managers kicks off silly season
We’ll soon be in the middle of the GAA’s silly season.
Once the All-Ireland football final is over, it’s time to look ahead and dream of what next year may bring.
But one would be forgiven for thinking that the silly season started much earlier than usual this year.
Just take a look at Cavan a few weeks ago.
Tommy Carr hadn’t the backing of the clubs but insisted he had the backing of the players.
The former Dublin player took the surprise decision to stay on. Carr may have recorded good victories over Offaly and Kildare during his time in charge of Roscommon but things went pearshaped in the second and third years of his term.
He didn’t succeed with Dublin either and his first year with Cavan was a disaster. The team were a shambles tactically and were simply outplayed by both Antrim and Wicklow.
Cavan were a bottom ten side when Carr took over. Now they’re a bottom six side.
So why did Carr stay on knowing he had very little support within the county? Either way, it’s another case of a former player living off his name from his days as a player.
County boards are always eager to appoint such individuals.
As I write, Joe Kernan has taken over as Galway manager.
The deal was done and dusted a few weeks ago. The immediate reaction in Galway is difficult to interpret. The word that also applied to the brand of football Armagh played under Kiernan, mixed to say the least, is probably the fairest comment.
It’s a baffling appointment. Big Joe recently turned down the chance to return as Armagh boss.
He said at the time he could never see himself managing another county and he also cited a busy schedule with his business for reasons not to go back to Armagh.
A few weeks later and the Armagh man caused a big surprise by declaring his interest in the Galway job.
The initial link was the fact that his mother hails from Ballinasloe.
This isn’t a link so much as a smokescreen to the fact that things have slowed down in the construction industry and there are a lot of “Joe’s” out there who aren’t going to turn down a job if they get an offer.
The current recession appears to impact on everyone, the GAA included, but a lot of county boards are fond of chasing the reputable managers.
There was a general acceptance within Galway football circles that the well had run dry in financial terms so the idea of paying expenses to a manager from further afield wasn’t expected to be a runner.
However, Joe Kernan won’t be driving from Armagh to Galway.
Instead, he’ll be driving to Dublin Airport and will get an Aer Arann flight to Galway Airport. From there he’ll make the ten-minute journey to Claregalway to Galway’s football training ground.
With no return flight available late at night Joe will be put up in a nearby hotel and will make the journey back to the north the following day.
One presumes he’ll be doing this an average of three times a week for training.
According to a well-placed source, it was a bit of a “solo run” appointment in the sense that one man got it into his head that Galway needed a high profile name.
You could say, from a totally football perspective, that this appointment is akin to what the current government did shortly before the first signs of trouble in the economy became clear they threw money at problems.
It’s what some county boards do regularly.
When they sense frustration and anger among followers, a big name is brought in to create a bit of excitement, and in doing so portrays the image of a county with serious ambition and great vision.
As I’ve mentioned many times before, only Eugene McGee and John O’Mahony in the last 50 years (and probably well beyond that) have managed to win AllIreland football titles with counties they weren’t natives of McGee with Offaly in ‘82 and O’Mahony with Galway in ‘98 and ‘01.
In the case of John O’Mahony, the combination of a big number of naturally talented players (and crucially, leaders) was brilliantly guided by the Ballaghaderreen man to two titles.
Eight years on from the second of those AllIrelands, Galway have struggled to come to terms with the fact that key individuals on that team were “once in a lifetime players”.
Such players can’t be simply replaced.
There was a feeling in Galway that maybe Galway could reach the mountain top one last time but it wasn’t to be. Since the AllIreland final victory of ‘01, Galway haven’t made it past the quarter-final stage.
There’s no disputing Joe Kernan’s credentials but the reality remains that Galway are not the force of old.
If Padraic Joyce decides to call it a day (he didn’t train for over a month during the championship with a back problem this year), then the number of leaders on the team are thin on the ground.
That, coupled with the fact that Galway have always been classed as very much a skills-based side.
Under Joe Kiernan, Armagh were, how shall I put it, a win at all costs side that. Alongside Tyrone they changed football for the worse over the last seven years.
Galway football could do with a bit of steel.
They may just get an injection of it to the extent that honest players with clean images will be playing a game they’re not familiar with, the majority of which won’t want or won’t be able to adapt to.
And finally....
Bear with me while I play one of my broken records again. Isn’t it gas that a GAA fan isn’t allowed initially to run onto a pitch when their team wins an All-Ireland final on Croke Park but fans of U2 can trample the same surface to their hearts content while listening to a band that doesn’t pay tax here?
Or better still, that Kilkenny and Tipperary weren’t allowed a ‘run out’ in Croke Park ahead of the All-Ireland hurling final. The sum total of that simple equation is that GAA players and fans come a distant second and third to bands and their fans at Croke Park.
Croke Park’s Peter McKenna said after the semi-final between Meath and Kerry that there was some work to do on the pitch but most players hadn’t a problem with the pitch following the 70 minutes of Irish style ice-skating we witnessed two weeks ago.
The state of the Croke Park pitch has cost teams games this year, with defenders losing their footing in an attempt to win possession, leading to their marker getting a free run on goal.
It’s not good enough. Such lip service from Peter McKenna is an insult to players.
Most players couldn’t be happy with the surface (which was brought in from Scunthorpe) because most players struggle to keep their footing if the surface is wet. God be with the times when there used to be Irish grass at Croke Park.
Those were the days...
Main News Page |
Previous Page
|
|
|
|
Facebook
Twitter
