AFTER the Ulster final last year, Jimmy McGuinness stood on an articulated trailer in the centre of Donegal town and told the throngs,”There is only one thing left for us to win, and we are going to go after that with everything we have.” Since then, a panel of players that looked very ordinary before […]
LIKE the Little Red Hen, Jimmy doesn’t need any help. But unlike the Little Red Hen, he doesn’t ask for it. I watched them training once in 2011, shortly before their All-Ireland semi-final against Dublin and was amazed that, apart from the goalies, he took the entire session himself. The drills, the running, the talks […]
THERE used to be a county court judge in the North who did not like hearing complicated cases, a sensible man who liked to get home early in the day. Once, I had an equity civil bill in front of him, neighbours fighting over a ten foot square of land at the bottom of their […]
ON Saturday I got a lift to the Mayo game with a lad from Ballina. As we got close to MacHale park, two hours early, there were parking spaces everywhere. “There’s one,” I said. He drove past it. “There’s another one.” He drove past it. “I don’t know how to reverse Joe,” he said. “How did […]
KEVIN McStay told TG4 before the throw-in against Armagh, “We’re going to play the game on its merits and see if we can come up with two points and that sums it up really. Hopefully, the wind stays nice and mild, because we all know about the wind.” I assumed this was some sort of […]
IT must be very confusing being Paddy Tally. In the first round, we played Tyrone, who he coached. In the second, Kerry, who he coached. In Celtic Park on Saturday evening, it was Galway, who he also coached. It is a wonder he remembers which dressing room to go into. Paddy also previously coached Derry. […]
ARMAGH had played their first game against Galway as though the old rules still applied, in line with a school of thought that was popular before the league started that the new game only required a tweak of the old one. As one inter-county coach said to me, “We think we can still make do with […]
THE old rules died at the weekend and good riddance. The finale was the Crossmolina penalty, which was the worst decision since Brexit. Just before throw in at Pearse Stadium for the Galway Armagh game, I received a Whatsapp: “The rocket is fuelled and the final countdown to a new dawn has begun.” It was not […]
BEFORE the throw in, Killarney Dr Crokes’ manager Pat O’Shea looked worried. He had every right to be. Torturing Kerry men is, after all, a cherished Canavan family tradition. God, meanwhile, was smiling and chatting in the stand, as though he knew something the rest of us didn’t. Which I suppose is one of the benefits […]
I WAS in Donegal last week and three different people told me – in absolute confidence (“Don’t mention my name Joe”) – that in their in house training games, Michael Murphy has been playing in goals. According to them, Jimmy has discovered a loophole in the no pass to the keeper rule, by not putting […]
