Old order had fresh look

Seán Óg Ó hAilpín in full flight. The NaPiarsaigh man is Diarmuid O’Flynn’s choice for hurler-of-the-year.

IT’S been a while, hasn’t it? There must be something positive to be said about spending two months on the flat of your back, but, having watched the business end of the GAA season go tearing past, one exhilarating game after another, I can’t think of anything.

Would have been nice to have made it back for the two All-Ireland finals; however, when the surgeon who fixed your spine tells you that the first instrument he used was the scalpel, the second was a Black and Decker drill, you tend to stay in your box, follow instructions to the letter. Second time round (first operation was in 1996), there would be no rushing this one.

Speaking of those two All-Ireland finals, there are those now bemoaning the fact that it seems to herald a return to the old order, Cork and Kerry, All-Ireland hurling and football champions respectively, same-o, same-o. Count me out, on that one. Low standards in high places aren’t worth a curse to the GAA. Cork and Kerry, 29 senior hurling titles, 33 senior football, are doing what they’ve done so many times in the past, setting a very high target for the rest.

They are not there by divine right, but by sporting right; those wins were hard earned, fully deserved and we’ve got champions worthy of the name, in both codes. John Maughan and his co-selectors in Mayo and Brian Cody in Kilkenny, can go home and analyse those games ’til they wear out the videotapes, but the simple fact is that they lost to two supremely talented teams that were prepared and tuned to the nth degree. Quite simply, they were unbeatable on the day, neither of them going to be denied again.

Would have been great, of course, to see Mayo win their first title since 1951, good also had Waterford and Wexford contested the hurling final, better yet had Waterford gone on to win it. The reality is that they weren’t good enough, any of them. All were found wanting where it matters most, on the field, and that is the very essence of the championship, of any championship. The best will triumph, the very best; the rest will have to lick their wounds, go away, appraise their weaknesses, raise their game, come back stronger. Hopefully, they will.

There are also those bemoaning the fact that Wexford and Waterford, having won their provincial championships, were denied places in the final by Cork and Kilkenny, who were coming through the back door.

“The qualifiers were put in place to give the weaker counties a better chance,” they moan, “but look what happens, it actually works to the advantage of the stronger counties; now, Cork, Kilkenny and Tipperary will have to be beaten twice, every year.”

Those people are wrong. For the umpteenth time, let it be explained: the qualifiers were introduced in hurling so that we’d have real All-Ireland semi-finals, even a few decent quarter-finals. It was done to raise the profile of the All-Ireland championship, of hurling, not solely for the benefit of what are seen as the weaker counties.

And they did benefit, as Offaly did in winning it all in 1998, as Clare almost did in 2002. Next year it changes again, and again, those changes are for the benefit of all of hurling. Inevitably, Cork, Kilkenny, Tipperary, will all be heavily involved, when the business end of the season arrives. Inevitably, because they are the three strongest hurling counties. Is that good for the game? Of course it is, and long may it last. What would be better, what would be an awful lot better than moaning about the competitive set-up, is that the likes of Waterford and Wexford would raise their game.

Lying back for the past couple of months, feeling very mortal physically, something else struck me. Do I know anything at all about hurling? Almost every All-Star selection I’ve seen so far has had one Tommy Walsh chosen in defence and usually at corner-back. Nothing at all against the young man, a thorough-going gent and a brilliant hurler, but I wouldn’t even have had him in the Kilkenny defence. He was an All-Star forward/midfielder last year, that’s where he should have stayed. Burned for 1-3 at corner-back against Galway, a beaten team; caught for two points against Clare first time out; totally outclassed by Niall Gilligan, eventually sent off, which should have cost Kilkenny the game; outclassed again against Waterford, Paul Flynn man-of-the-match on a beaten team; beaten again in the All-Ireland final by Timmy McCarthy.

Even within Kilkenny, Michael Kavanagh is a better corner-back, as is Philly Larkin, James Ryall; Wayne Sherlock is an automatic in one corner in my All-Star side; Michael Maher of Tipp, Limerick’s Damien Reale, Cork’s Brian Murphy, Galway’s Ollie Canning are all better candidates than the Kilkenny youngster for the other. As for the half-back line, give me a break; Sean Og O hAilpin, JJ Delaney and Ronan Curran are the three outstanding contenders for hurler-of-the-year. Sean Og is my choice for hurler-of-the-year, yet he couldn’t even make The Sunday Game Allstar team. Oh yes, I wouldn’t have Henry Shefflin on my team either and again I’ll probably be on my lonesome on that. Henry deserves a nomination, but did not have an Allstar season, not by his own high standards, not by any standards. Verily lads, I must have gone completely off the boil.