Paul Rouse: If there’s no room for pleasure in the GAA, what is the point?

Yes, identity matters. Yes, representing where you’re from matters. Yes, winning matters. But none of this matters like the game itself.

FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME: There is something that is not at all ‘modern’ that lives at the heart of all modern sport: the idea of play and the pleasure it gives. It is this pleasure that is the great engine of sport; it links sporting modernity to millennia of history. Picture: ©INPHO/James Crombie

The best thing about Ciarán Murphy’s book, ‘This is the Life: Days and Nights in the GAA’, is that it nudges you towards a reckoning with yourself. More of that a bit further down.

It is a book (now out in paperback) that contains multitudes, as can only be expected from a man who has had such a range of experiences as a player (county, college, school and clubs), as a commentator and analyst (Second Captains, The Irish Times and the Tuam Herald), and as a supporter (Galway and Milltown).