Liam Sheedy: Who can dig into the hurt to find that extra 10%?
HEALING POWERS: Galway manager Henry Shefflin will look to channel the hurt of last year. Pic: INPHO/Ryan Byrne
Using the hurt from last year is a GAA cliche. And maybe it is trotted out too often. But it has real meaning too. It’s a ploy tried in every dressing room in every sport to harness energy or to build motivation or just get sharper focus out of players. Do not underestimate the fuel it provides to push groups to higher levels of performance.
Even the most professional, high-performance environments go down this road. I heard the Arsenal goalkeeper, Aaron Ramsdale, talk about it after his team won a crucial game away at Newcastle towards the end of the Premier League season. Before the match, the Arsenal manager, Mikel Arteta, showed the players a video of the look on their faces following a costly defeat in the same fixture the year before. “We had that burning desire as soon as we left the hotel that it wasn’t going to be the same today,” Ramsdale said. “It may have given us extra motivation. When we needed to dig deep, it really helped us.”
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