Hurling’s walk on the wild side

HARD to imagine Lar Corbett or John Mullane coming out with that one and, indeed, neither did. The pithy statement was, rather, the summation of one of the players from a team known as the Wild Geese as they left the field following a game on Saturday.

Hailing from — you guessed it — the United States (the US Air Force, actually) the Wild Geese were one of eight teams taking part in the first Thurles Sarsfields International Hurling 13s Festival.

While none of their number is likely to have Declan Ryan chewing his pencil in the coming weeks, the team made up for their lack of the rudiments of hurling with fierce commitment, enthusiasm and pure enjoyment of the game throughout the tournament in the shadows of Semple Stadium.