Players warm to Gaelic Park

THE GAA will be pressing ahead with plans for regional ‘centres of excellence’ featuring floodlit synthetic playing surfaces with even more enthusiasm following the positive response from the players who took part in the Vodafone Allstars exhibition game in New York’s Gaelic Park on Saturday.

The Richie Bennis-managed 2007 selection defeated the 2006 side by 6-9 to 4-11. But the occasion was as noteworthy for the showcasing of the vastly enhanced facility — described by Bennis as an ‘earth pitch’ when he first played there with the Munster hurlers in 1969 — as the fact that the weather was arguably the coldest that any inter-county teams previously experienced at home or abroad.

The temperature was close to zero but it was the wind-chill factor which made it so unpleasant for the players and a crowd of less than a thousand (with light snow falling overnight). To be fair, while the standard of play in the first half wasn’t very exciting, 2006 manager Brian Cody argued that criticism of the teams would be unwarranted specifically because of the weather.