Limerick leaders in sporting generosity

YOU didn’t have to be at Stradey Park on Saturday for Munster’s latest Heineken Cup heroics to appreciate just how bad the conditions were.

The sight of Ronan O’Gara shivering in the face of a ferocious icy storm that went from bad to worse as the game progressed, said it all.

Despite the hardship, like the rest of his Munster team-mates, O’Gara was still utterly focused on winning this game. In the circumstances it was as fine a performance as we’ve ever seen from Munster. Without question, this is a team of teams, these are players among players. Not for the first time, they gave us reason to cheer last Saturday. I don’t give a damn about the conditions, the lack of fancy play — this was sport at its finest.

A word to all you GAA supporters out there, however. I would remind you all of one thing – these are all professionals. Every one of those players is on a good salary but it wasn’t the money they were playing for in that game; it was the jersey, it was Munster.

Three of those guys aren’t even from this hemisphere, never mind this province, yet Shaun Payne, Rua Tipoki and Lifeimi Mafi gave everything for the cause; never can it more truly be stated that players left everything on the field.

Which leads me to the point of this piece. Over the last few weeks, as the Ulster-led opposition to the government grant scheme to GAA players gathered momentum, all the feverish talk of pay-for-play, the ‘boogeyman’ fear of professionalism that permeates the GAA, I have been simmering away here.

It seems to me there are three main groups driving the objections.

The first are the ‘disaffected rump’ still grieving over the loss of Croke Park to ‘other’ sports.

There’s a large constituency in the GAA who see ‘Gaelic Games’ as somehow purer, cleaner, superior to all other sports, and see all those who play them in the same light. Among those are the sad group who have a poisonous opinion of those who play or support other sports, soccer and rugby particularly. We’re a superior people, runs their thinking, with superior sports, superior values and superior attitudes.

They lost the Croke Park debate but by heavens, they weren’t going to lose this; not on their watch, there would be none of this grant nonsense, which – as any fool can see – is really full-blown professionalism by another name.

Then you have those who were not at all bothered by the Croke Park issue, who welcomed soccer and rugby for the extra revenue it brought in if nothing else, but many of whom have no problem with other sports. What they do have a problem with is the growing player power, with the GPA particularly (some of those in the first rump would also have this problem with the GPA); as far as they’re concerned the players, the GPA, should shut up and accept what they’re getting, leave the running of the GAA to those who really matter — the elected officers.

Finally, you have those who are as open-minded as anyone in any sport, who enjoy a range of sports, but who love the amateur status – false as it is, and has been for decades – and who have genuine fears the grants are the start of the ‘slippery slope’ to professionalism.

They are all wrong in every one of their fears and objections.

Over the coming years the debate about full or part-time professionalism in the GAA will continue, and rightly so. Reward for effort is a basic human desire and when you look at the money generated by these players, it’s a very pertinent subject. And that’s the most salient point here, the money generated. I can break my arse in training seven hours a day, seven days a week in pursuit of my chosen sport but if no-one pays to see me play, what am I entitled to?

This grant scheme, however, forms no part of that debate. It is government recognition that these guys, the hurlers and footballers, are contributing hugely to Irish society.

I was at the Limerick county GAA convention on Sunday. Limerick is a county where they appreciate all sports, where generosity of spirit prevails, where Munster’s rugby effort on Saturday afternoon was fully appreciated, even by the hardcore GAA fans.

Not once did I hear a complaint, either during the public debate or in private conversation afterwards, about the grant scheme, not once did I hear a word of criticism. Knowing them as I do, respecting them as I do, I’m not surprised; let’s take our lead from Limerick on this.

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