The sideline battle: ‘Clare are louder than Galway, Kiely gets excited, Meyler is gas’
The storm exists outside the white lines as well.
When the All-Ireland semi-finals throw in this weekend, your eye will be drawn to the action on the field of play, but there’s often a parallel competition on the sideline.
Managers, water carriers, medics, selectors, and subs can crowd the strip of grass under the Hogan Stand, but is there an undercurrent of tension that sometimes breaks into the open?
Dan Shanahan lit up Croke Park as a player but in recent years he patrolled the perimeter as a Waterford selector for Derek McGrath. He became very familiar with the stretch of real estate he calls “the loneliest place in the world”.
“It can be a tough place,” he says.
“The side of the field in Croke Park. Everyone knows best; everyone is an expert when they’re not going up and down the sideline. Thousands of people looking down at you waiting for a switch or a substitution.”
How combative does it get between the management teams, then?
“A lot of that depends on how the game is going, the situation in the game.
“Look, if one of your lads has gone down with a knock, and someone on the opposing bench is shouting at the ref that he’s letting on, you’re going to respond. You have to stick up for your own — any selector or manager will do that.
“There’s a bit of man-marking goes on as well. There was a classic example of that last year when we played Cork in the All-Ireland semi-final. Sully (Diarmuid O’Sullivan, then a Cork selector) went out to talk to one of the Cork lads, but because he was near a Waterford player, I went out too.
"He was doing his job, I was doing mine, and there was no hassle — but at the same time you’re covering him. We go back a long way, obviously, we spent years hopping off each other when we played ourselves, but even though there might be the odd one-liner between us, there’s too much respect there to ever go over the top.
“You’d be conscious you’re being watched, too, with something like that. The crowd, the subs — they’ll pick up on it if you don’t react to something the other side do.
“You don’t need to be told anyway, because if you’re any good, after spending that kind of time with the players you’re ready to die for them, because of everything they’ve given. You’d back them all the way.”
Shanahan has shared a sideline with all the participants tomorrow, in Munster and All-Ireland championship games. What are they like in the white heat, when a referee’s call or a player’s error raises the blood pressure levels?
“Micheál (Donoghue, Galway manager), he does his own job, he’s calm on the sideline, concentrating on his own team. We’d never have crossed each other’s paths, really, during a game.
“Last year’s All-Ireland was probably the biggest day of our careers and his, but there wasn’t a bad word between us. He’s very tuned-in, very focused.
“There’s a strong bond there with the Galway lads. You’d notice it, absolutely. I know people in every team feel that’s the case, and maybe it is, but you can see it with them — with the way they’ve bought into the game-plan on the field of play, but also the way they behave with each other on the subs bench, with the backroom team. They’re a team.”
It’s a less sedate rivalry with Galway’s opponents tomorrow.
“With Clare it can be different. We’ve had a few words with them — there was a bit of chat, definitely, when we played them in our first game in the Munster championship in Cusack Park. There was a bit of chat from Donal Moloney (Clare joint manager), and from us in return.
“That’s the business you’re in. You’re entitled to pass their area, they’re entitled to pass yours, and you’d never take it personal if there’s a comment. It’s not meant personally. It’s the pressure they’re under, the pressure you’re under to get the best out of your own team.
“There’s no comparison in terms of volume. Clare are a lot louder on the sideline than Galway. They’re passionate about their teams, which maybe goes back to Davy Fitzgerald when he was manager, Ger Loughnane.
“And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I wouldn’t pretend to be a saint myself, I’m passionate when I’m on the line myself, but you shake hands after and wish them the best no matter how the game goes. Clare are the same.”
Tomorrow’s game involves Cork and Limerick, two teams well known to Shanahan. Two managers he knows well.
“John Kiely (Limerick) is different again, he often gets excited enough on the line — but if you notice, it’s all
directed towards the team, towards the field. Not at the opposition.
“He and Paul Kinnerk (selector) would move around the field but would never speak to you — their focus is on their own team.
“When we played them we had a bad day, obviously enough — John gave me a wink afterwards as much to say ‘keep going’ as anything.
“Don’t forget, nobody knows better than the management of one team what the management of another team is going through, particularly when things aren’t going well. Managers are in contact with each other all the time at that level, so there’s always a respect there.”
And Cork?
“(Cork manager John) Meyler is gas when I see him wearing pants and shoes on the line, I always think of the Premier League when I see him. I’d say that’s his son David’s influence on him.
“Again, he’s looking after his own. Never a bad word. After the relegation game in the league, for instance, he just shook hands and wished us all the best.
“I’m looking forward to both games, I’d expect two great contests. On the field, certainly.
“When I think of it, I’ll check out how the management teams are behaving, but there’ll probably be enough going on in
the games themselves to concentrate on.”
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