Nice to mix with gods but football still wins hands down with me

At the height of the debate about opening up Croke Park to ‘foreign’ games, a hurling aficionado of my acquaintance offered up a soundbite for the ages.

A clash of the ash purist — but then, is there any other kind? — he declared, with tongue only partly in-cheek, that if it was up to him he wouldn’t even allow Gaelic football to be played in the holy ground.

So I can only imagine how delighted he must have been with the first episode of The Game on RTÉ on Monday night, a ravishing celebration of hurling in which, from its bold title onwards, hype and history relentlessly rhymed.