Sometimes Jose Mourinho seems the most heartless man in football.

You heard the views of the Irish camp after losing to New Zealand last November.

The other day in a nice sitdown piece for RTÉ, Shane Horgan brought Brian O’Driscoll back to where it kind of all began for him: St Patrick’s weekend, 2000, Paris.

It hardly carried the glamour or gravitas of an induction into Cooperstown or Springfield, it wasn’t like there was a Larry Bird to welcome his Magic Johnson into this particular Hall of Fame, but there was something particularly pleasing about seeing Ronnie Whelan being honoured at the FAI International Awards on Sunday.

Maybe he wouldn’t still be playing for Tyrone now.

It says something about the stature and skill of the man that we’re talking more about how football will miss Colm Cooper this year than Kerry will miss him.

It’s very possible every top-eight hurling team will improve in 2014.

I can still hear the hurt as well as the dignity in Seán Stack’s voice.

Every year we keep hearing that the national league is the second-most important competition in Gaelic football, but it’s actually not true.

When Billy Morgan and Michael Ryan questioned the GAA’s insistence that in a few years’ time all senior club and inter-county coaches or managers will have to have undergone a recognised coaching course, they had a point.