Eimear Ryan: A GAA winter is a hinge for pause, reflection and considering futures

As we bid farewell to another year, there’s a clutch of players departing the stage, both at intercounty and club level

Wed, 21 Dec, 2022 - 15:00

In the end, last Sunday worked out beautifully. I got to watch the opening half hour (and the first goal) of the soccer match before slinking away upstairs to fire up Ballyhale and Ballygunner on TG4 Player (always more reliable than its RTÉ cousin). Strangely, the tempo of the hurling match felt more urgent than the World Cup final: both teams keenly familiar with each other at this stage, both going at one another hammer and tongs – a stark contrast with France’s cagey approach to defending their title.

It was a match that made you glad to be cozy on a couch watching, but it also stoked the mad desire to immediately run outside for a few pucks (yellow Mikasa gloves mandatory).

Moments to remember: the agonising slow-motion footage of on-form Ballyhale corner-forward, Joe Cuddihy, pulling up injured. You have to feel for these players, on the go for dozens of weeks, playing in freezing temperatures. Anyone who has suffered a similar injury – who has been arrested, mid-stride, by some uncooperative muscle, tendon or joint – was wincing along in sympathy to those images of Cuddihy. I hope he gets a chance to rest up over the break and is in with a fighting chance of taking the field for the All-Ireland final on the 21st of January.

Moments to savour: Stephen O’Keeffe’s absolute masterclass between the posts. No sooner was I tweeting in awe of his performance than TJ Reid finally found the net from his second penalty, but nonetheless, the former Waterford keeper was in bursting-out-of-his-skin form. He’d made four excellent saves, and prevented Ballyhale from opening the gap as they kicked into a higher gear, when Reid won and converted the second penalty. There was something special about seeing Reid and O’Keeffe face up to each other for the penalties – Messi and Lloris come to mind – and it feels right that they finished all square, one apiece, in that individual battle.

As with the soccer match, you felt that neither team deserved to lose, really, even though both Ballyhale and Argentina had that small bit of extra juice in the tank. Eoin Cody was in marauding form, winning and distributing ball in a manner you might describe as TJ-esque. He, Adrian Mullen, and the Reid brothers will now contest their second All-Ireland final of the 2022 season and their fourth All-Ireland club final in a row – savage resilience and stats.

Back to the soccer, where I entertained myself by murmuring ‘Hon Tipp’ under my breath every time I spotted a Boca Juniors jersey among the Argentina fans. But there was even more drama to come. Despite my hurling detour, I got bang for my buck in the form of two further goals, extra-time and penalties. Never let anyone tell you that you can’t have it all.

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As we bid farewell to another year, there’s a clutch of players departing the stage, both at intercounty and club level. The GAA season has been disrupted and revamped in recent years, due to Covid rejigging, the split season, and the ongoing professional-level demands of intercounty squads. As a result, there’s no longer a long fallow season, but the winter still functions as a sort of hinge, where players pause, reflect, and consider their positions for the following year.

Among the players heading off into the sunset and a well-deserved retirement are the redoubtable Michael Murphy of Donegal, who will head straight into a punditry career with GAAGo; Laois talisman Ross Munnelly, whose retirement statement, headed with the words ‘Life begins at 40’, was one of the most succinct and uplifting I’ve read; Limerick’s second-choice keeper Barry Hennessy, who showed extraordinary courage this year by speaking out about his experiences with disordered eating; Shaun Murphy, the pacy and intuitive Wexford defender who has grappled with serious injury in recent years; and Johnny Coen, surely one of the most versatile and fun-to-watch players of the modern age, who came onto the Galway team as a corner-back, wound up as a corner-forward, and won an All-Ireland in 2017 at midfield.

On the club front – which must be the most heartbreaking retirement decision of all – not-men-but-giants Anthony Nash and Dan Shanahan are hanging up their boots. And then there’s players like Marc Coleman, who still have plenty of years left in the tank, but will have to sit out the 2023 season due to injury, surgery and recovery.

It can be frustrating, weighing it all up. What if you stop, and the next year your club wins the county? What if you go back for one more year, only to find that it’s diminishing returns? With most things in life, you get better as you go. If you’re willing to learn from experience and mistakes, you get better at your job, at relationships, at parenting, at looking after yourself. But that’s not the way it is in sport; it’s one of those rare arenas when you decline early. You have to face frailty and endings at a relatively young age. And even though you can see the end coming, it still takes some time to process.

It’s never an easy thing, knowing when the time is right. Sometimes, as in the case of Pádraic Maher, the decision is wrenched out of your hands; more difficult, having no agency, but maybe also in a way easier, having no choice. Sometimes you know, just listening to your body, that you can’t give much more, at least not at the level and pace you would want to offer your team. Sometimes, if you’re very lucky, you get to depart at the absolute peak of your achievement, Leo Messi-style. But that is a rare phenomenon. To everyone pondering this decision over the break, I wish you a lovely festive period and all the best in 2023 – whichever way you decide.