Brilliant Brady’s game in hand

IT’S one thing breaking records, it’s quite another to break the record of a legend. Paul Brady is a three-time world champion in handball, which by itself should be enough to put him on a sporting pedestal in Ireland.

Last weekend, however, the Cavan man broke a record many thought would last forever; when he overcame the challenge of Armagh’s Charly Shanks in the All-Ireland 40x20 singles final, he claimed his eighth title and thus overtook the record of Michael ‘Ducksy’ Walsh. For good measure he also set a new consecutive record, at seven.

This is not to say, of course, that he has overtaken Ducksy completely; like Christy Ring in hurling, whenever handball is spoken, the name of Ducksy Walsh will be up there in lights, the greatest ever. Ducksy, you see, was a master of both the smaller, international court — the 40x20 — but he was even more supreme in the bigger, Irish court, the 60x30, and his record of 38 national senior titles (both courts, singles and doubles) will surely never be surpassed.

Nevertheless, a sweet moment for Paul: “It’s great, it’s what I’ve been training for almost since the start, more than 12 years ago. In a way though it was sort of anti-climactic, with the doubles final to come this weekend (he teams up with Michael Finnegan as Cavan take on Meath) I haven’t had time to think about it (the record), to be honest — it’s going to take a while to sink in.”

Though he started on the big court, the small court is where Paul has really made his name, because the small court is where it’s at internationally.

Handball is a minority sport in Ireland, a minority sport also in the USA and Canada, but there’s a major difference between being a minority in a country of four million and a country of nearly 300 million. In the States handball was big enough to support a select group of professional handballers. Into their midst stepped the young Paul Brady, over a decade ago, and how he has thrived.

“I was going there fairly early in my career but I’d say it really took off in my late teens, when I was winning the underage grades — 17, 18, 19. I finished college when I was 20, went there for nearly two years, with breaks back here every month — I’d go there for a few weeks, come home for a few weeks, go back again. I was playing against them regularly and that helped; to beat a ranked professional player was a huge thing for an Irish player, but once I got my mind around the possibility that I could do it, it started happening for me. It became almost second-nature to beat the number 13 player, to beat the number seven player, and those two years were very important for me. I rose up the rankings, got to number two or three a few times. The ball and the courts there are a lot faster than here, which actually suited my style. I was more successful over there for those few years than I was here!

“It was a case of becoming more confident. It used to be that the Americans and the Canadians dominated but now it’s the Irish, at every grade, the game has gone full circle. That’s good to see.”

So dominant did the Irish become, in fact, that at the world championships of 2009 they almost swept the boards, a record haul of 35 titles, including Paul’s third Open Singles title in a row.

The Irish are the new benchmark, and though he balks at the notion, Paul is the benchmark for the Irish. “I wouldn’t say that – modern media has made a big difference, there’s a lot more access to what’s happening internationally. I didn’t see any American player ‘til I was about 15 but the young lads now see them in action all the time, following the tournaments on the web or whatever. As a result they’re a lot more confident now than we were at the same age, they’re exposed to a lot more international competition a lot earlier, they see all the different styles of play.”