The Sunday shadow in paradise

LAST Sunday you saw it once again, the way this summer can’t help pandering shamelessly to the tastes of the hurling snobs among us.

Snobs, of course, may not be quite the right word, but recognisers-of-the-obvious doesn’t have quite the same snappiness.

To be fair to those who were in Croke Park on Saturday afternoon, they saw a football game of enterprise and spirit, and the end was pretty close: a little experience, a touch of nous, and Derry could have been rubbing their eyes before a semi-final against fellow Ulster side Monaghan.

Derry’s lesson on Saturday was still valid early on Sunday afternoon, but Monaghan hadn’t learned it; a couple of safe-option points and they would have sent the Kingdom home unhappy.

But the hurling game which followed made the football quarter-final look lo-cal, sugar-free, decaffeinated. From the throw-in, the structured passion on show from Limerick made it compelling; Waterford’s efforts to reel in their lead made it unforgettable.

The best of the season? Maybe. For our money, the relative hiatus for a period in the second half put the game at a rung slightly below Cork-Waterford I for sheer entertainment, or Limerick-Tipperary II for outrageous drama, but we’re not about to belabour the point. Nobody ever forced Dickens to choose from among his books, did they?

ALL is not quite perfect in the Garden of Eden, however. During the week, the Dublin hurler Peadar Carton had his suspension overturned on a technicality.

Carton, you may remember, was the player who struck Tipperary defender Paul Curran in the qualifiers, breaking the Tipp man’s jaw in the process.

At the time, we wondered about the relative silence which met this incident, particularly from the mouthacáns who condemned the pre-game row between Cork and Clare. That ongoing lack of noise from those outraged by counties appealing the disciplinary process in their case can only be taken as tacit approval for Dublin’s success with the rules on this occasion.

It simply goes to show that some counties can expect to be portrayed differently to others, but maybe “show” doesn’t nail it. “Prove” would probably be closer to the point. The county boards of Cork and Clare may be a little annoyed with the negative coverage they received in many quarters when all they did was use the disciplinary avenues instituted for appeals, but they can’t have been too surprised.

All of the above shouldn’t be construed as an attack on Peadar Carton, by the way, a man we don’t know and a player against whom we bear no personal grudge.

But he’s a lucky youngster he was born in the capital. If he was a native of Feakle or Sixmilebridge, Cloyne or Farranree, he could have looked forward to a few weeks’ coverage in the national media which would have been a lot more pointed than the bland statements we saw during the week.

LESS of the metaphorical head-shaking, however.

Limerick-Waterford last week — or the Munster Final On Tour, if you like — ended with a deserved win for the men in green. At the start of this year we suggested that this would be the year in which tactics would finally come to be an accepted part of hurling, and Limerick certainly came to Croke Park with a plan. More importantly, they stuck to that plan.

After the game, Limerick behaved as they have all season, throwing open the dressing room door to all and sundry. Want to interview one of the lads? Go in and sit next to them; if he’s a towel on, he’s media-ready. That’s their way. That’s the Richie Bennis way.

Some Waterford people bridled when Richie said his side scored five goals and Dan Shanahan hadn’t scored one, and maybe they were right. Or maybe Richie was being honest, in the first flush of an unexpected victory. Or maybe they were both right.

We’d prefer to remember the image of Dan and Richie shaking hands afterwards: the respect on Richie’s face for an opponent in that photo is more eloquent than anything he said later.

But nothing last Sunday was more eloquent than the last word of the afternoon, the alpha expression of the sunny South-east. Both teams had gone to the players’ lounge when we found, wandering around the side of the team bus, one of the Waterford players searching for his comrades. We caught his eye and stuck out a hand to commiserate.

“Well,” he said, his voice flat and tired.

We shook hands, and he kept on walking. He looked small and alone in the empty tunnel, and eventually turned the corner and disappeared from view.

Contact: [e-mail]