IT’S been a good couple of weeks for female players, especially ladies footballers. Hot on the heels of the Ladies Association announcing that they would pay travel expenses during the National League, Minister of State for Sport Jack Chambers has said that female GAA players will receive the same amount of funding as their male counterparts. This equality should be non-negotiable. You may not follow these two female sports, and that’s fine – although last year’s football and camogie championships were highly entertaining – but nobody can seriously deny that they are not putting in the same effort and commitment as the footballers and hurlers. These sports are growing rapidly, and TG4’s announcement that they will be showing 150 percent more of the LGFA’s National League in the coming weeks is just another bit of good news.

NIALL MCCOY

DERRY begin their league championship campaign this weekend with a game against Longford. My bad memories of Longford include a trip to a Qualifier game where I left late and ended up racing down the back roads to try to get to see at least some of the first half. When I got there, I wished I’d never bothered as I was treated to a dismal performance by the Leafers as the Leinster men comfortably disposed of them. Back in those days I was living in a happy world where I believed that Derry’s next great success was just around the corner. I was hopelessly wrong. Longford are, therefore, a warning sign. They are a reminder to go cautiously into a season. Make no grand statements, commit no emotion. We’ll just see how it goes.

RONAN SCOTT

I WAS covering a match in a place in Tyrone called Kildress at the weekend. Obviously it was played ‘behind closed doors’, and there were a few club members in shiny bibs called ‘Covid Officers’. Them’s the rules and all that, but it hardly seems necessary to me that no fans are allowed in whatsoever. The big problem last year was that clubs partied the bit out after matches – I remember someone telling me that people will drinking out of the cup after their team won the championship last year (not in Tyrone, by the way). That’s where the danger lies – not in letting a couple of hundred people into matches when cases of outdoor transmission are virtually zero, and always have been even before the vaccination process start.

NIALL GARTLAND

I WAS chatting to Belleek man Niall Fearon recently about Crossmaglen’s incredible run of success. We were talking about how, while their amazing talent was undisputable, their county, provincial and All-Ireland wins also owed a lot to their unrelenting work-rate. It sometimes got lost due to their nice style of play, but the Rangers were absolute work horses. Rarely, and it’s still the case, do they get out-worked. It popped into my head watching the Antrim and Clare match at the weekend. Clare were battling hard, but it was so clear that they were being out-worked by their hosts. Darren Gleeson’s side kept it going for 70 minutes, scrapping for breaks and pressing high on restarts. It was the difference between a narrow win and a narrow loss. Antrim are not as talented as the top teams in Ireland, but if they can maintain that work-rate they will make great progress.

NIALL MCCOY

IT’S hard to know what to expect from Tyrone this week. It’s a new management team for starts, there are a lot of new players, and they’ve only had four weeks in which to prepare to take on Donegal. It would be premature to read too much into things if they deliver an underwhelming performing, but nonetheless, it should give us a glimpse into what expect from the Logan/Dooher tenure. Will the style of play be radically different? Will the starting team remain fairly similar? Is Cathal McShane actually fit? I’m lucky enough to get to go to the match as I’ll be covering the game, and I haven’t been so excited about a Tyrone game in a few years. Hopefully the rain stays away anyway.

NIALL GARTLAND