Winning habit dies hard with Ireland’s finest
Checking the internet for the sports results yesterday morning it is notable, though, that there are teams and individuals you can always expect to appear in the winning columns and those more likely to have been defeated.
On that basis, one has to salute the durable men from Crossmaglen first.
The screen reveals that after an early scare against the lively men of Naomh Conaill from The Glenties, that they surged away in the end to finish comfortable winners by five points.
By my count, that gives them an eighth Ulster title, and that is some achievement for a club that suffered more than any other unit of the Association during the worst years of the Troubles.
Their pitch was converted into a military billet and the town was a cockpit for those Troubles.
But the mighty men from Cross survived it all.
I note they did the same in the Ulster final against their Donegal opponents.
Tony Kernan plunged himself into the fray with such fire that he quickly earned two yellow cards and was dismissed.
In many ways that is the kind of problem which has so often fired up Crossmaglen for their greatest battles. So it proved again.
According to the match report, I read the Donegal outfit had been far more impressive against 15 Armagh men than they were when the perennial champions put their shoulders to the wheel and got down to business.
They are surely a tough posse nowadays, with a hint of experience to boot.
When the chips were all down, it is notable that it was the boots of Oisin McConville that were once again vital.
How often has that not been the case before down the years?
How long can the man continue to perform at this level?
He scored the goal that energised the Rangers again after Kernan’s dismissal and ended the game with a nice 1-3 total.
That is a winning kind of performance. The Rangers will go a long way yet over territory they know very well indeed.
And when you speak of winners and are checking up on the net from abroad, then Munster are a good bet to have won again — no matter what was the opposition — and so thankfully was the case yesterday.
Maybe their victory was tarnished just a little by the dismissal of the returning Paul O’Connell but (a) the giant is back in action at a critical stage of the season and (b) by all accounts is rapidly returning towards his best form.
It is good to see his name at the heart of the action again and clearly he has lost none of his fire during the recovery.
The rest of the sports news on the screen reveals a success for the Irish here and there threaded in through the usual hype featuring players such as Tevez and Giggs and clubs like Chelsea and Liverpool et al.
Leinster, despite recent good seasons, still seem to appear more often in the losers’ list anytime I am away from home and checking the internet.
And so it proves again.
And for some strange reason, after all these years, I am still not too impressed by an equestrian success in Switzerland by a leading Irish show jumper.
We all have long memories whether we are at home or abroad.
* Contact: cormac66@hotmail.com
