Armagh make type of statement that will really register

We’ll start with the football rather than all that palaver between Armagh and the media and acknowledge what seems to be the county side’s burgeoning renaissance first.

Though their summer ended on Saturday night, Armagh departed the championship scene having served notice of their intention to return to the spotlight they enjoyed so regularly during the Noughties.

A decent Ulster championship was followed by a trot through the qualifiers where Tyrone, Roscommon and Meath were all done for, and then this perfectly respectable one-point loss against the Ulster champions in an All-Ireland quarter-final.

“I’m devastated about the result,” said Paul Grimley, who gave his first post-match press conference since the Cavan game, “but I’m proud that we threw caution to the wind and wanted to win the game from the very start. And, in a way, I think that shocked Donegal. We opened upextremely well and took the game to them. And, bar a period in the second half where they were in control, I thought for two-thirds of the match we were in control.”

The hit-and-miss media blackout that shadowed their run this past few months was, in reality, no more than aminor inconvenience to most on both sides of the barricades, but it was a stance that came across as childish on Saturday evening. For a team built on physicality and robustness, Armagh have proven to be remarkably thin-skinned, with the reasoning behind their refusal to engage with the majority of the media this summer proving to be something of a moveable feast. First it was the ‘Paradegate’ incident prior to their opener against Cavan and the media’s response to it which, Armagh claimed, persuaded the GAA’s biggest big wigs to lean on the disciplinarypowers that be and suspend three of their men. At another stage, a lack of respect for the county going back toprevious seasons was wielded. Two nights ago, we were told it was an Ulster championship launch in Belfast when selector Peter McDonnell hadn’t been asked for an interview by a single journalist.

Scatter-gun stuff and everyone was sprayed.

Grimley mentioned the first and last of those grievances after his side’s defeat to Donegal and added another for good measure, that of the county board apparentlybeing labelled ‘spineless’ in recent weeks.

The media — all of it apparently — was accused of “ugly” behaviour and “schoolboyish-type insults” with the Armagh manager insisting his amateur players were being treated worse than professional athletes in that regard.

Little of it would stand up to a stern cross-examination.

The evening had started with Armagh shunning thetraditional pre-match team photo as they ran onto the Croke Park pitch for their warm-up, but it was the last time they would shirk anything on a night that took them close to the last four.

Their stock, regardless of the silly buggers, is clearly on the up, though it remains to be seen if Grimley and Kieran McGeeney will continue to prowl the sideline together come 2015 or whether the latter will be elevated to the role of bainisteoir.

“There’s no better man to lead Armagh forward than Kieran McGeeney,” said Grimley. “Whether that is the case or not is irrelevant at the moment.”